Gamer Hunters
by swift56
Summary: A hunter, an aspiring doctor, a racer, and a street fighting dancer. What do they all have in common? Why, they all play video games of course! Oh, and they all got dragged into another world by the owner of a big-time video game company who wants their help. That's not something you hear everyday now is it? GAME START! (Cover by Magna Ryunoid)
1. Snipe Trailer

**SLOW DOWN PEOPLE!**

 **I'm only posting the customary trailers as this is a RWBY story.**

 **The actual story is still a while off from being posted.**

 **And even then, I started writing this during the little crash the site had, when no updates notifications were sent out for when a story updated, or, you know, when it was posted.**

 **And we start with the leader and marksmen.**

 **Yeah, kinda funny that Ex-Aid isn't the leader isn't it?**

* * *

The sounds of nature were heard in what looked like a Savannah environment.

A gazelle was soon seen running away from something, that thing soon revealing to be a black lion with white bone pieces on it's body and a white faceplate on the upper half it's face, and glowing red eyes.

It was pouncing in the air, ready to eat the gazelle, before a shot rang out, and the lion fell to the ground lifelessly, a bullet hole in it's head as it's body dissolved away into black smoke.

As for where the bullet came from...

Seen crouching on a thick branch on a distant (and we mean VERY distant) tree, was a young man with dark black hair that seemed to have a hint of navy blue and a thick bang that covered the right side of his face in neon green, leaving only his left eye exposed, showing it's color to be a ruby red.

His face could be described as above average, meaning that some people paid attention, and some people didn't.

He wore a navy blue sleeveless vest over a white tiger print shirt, a camo cloak over his body to fit into the Savannah, with simple dark green cargo pants and black boots.

In his hands was a navy blue sniper rifle with neon green tiger stripes painted onto it, before he pulled and twisted a few pieces and it shifted down to a somewhat bulky pistol.

"Target eliminated. Time for that pay the barman says he owes me." the young man muttered to himself as he jumped down from the tree, making his way back to town.

On his way there, he shot more black animals with white bone parts, including shooting a black elephant with a sleeping dart and taking it's tusks.

He'd learned that you couldn't take trophies if they died, but you could if you took your trophies while they were alive.

Besides, he could probably sell these for a good price, some collector would pay millions for it most likely.

He normally wouldn't do this kind of thing, as the only kind of hunting he originally did was for overpopulated species, but here, well those black creatures were a kill on sight type of deal.

When he reached the small village, which had a high wall to protect it from those creatures, he groaned when he got close to the tavern.

More idiotic bandits were there, and probably causing trouble.

As he was about to enter he moved aside, as a woman with long black hair and red eyes, wearing a red and black outfit with a blade sheathed at her hip, stepped out, muttering things along the lines of 'incompetent oafs' or 'useless drunkards'.

The bandits that were still outside started following her, seemingly trying to placate her.

The young man rose an eyebrow at that, discreetly snapping a picture of the woman as she turned her head to speak to one of her subbordinates, being able to catch a profile shot of her face.

He might be able to use it for refference and see if she had a bounty, after all, if he was right, she was the leader of the bandit group, and she was annoyed at the ones still in the tavern.

He smirked, pulling out a pair of gloves with metal plates on them and putting them on his hands.

He expected a fight, so he was going to be ready.

 **(Play Goya no Machiawase by Hello Sleepwalkers)**

He kicked in the door, quickly raising up his gloved hand and blocking a sword on the metal plate, before drawing his pistol and shooting the bandit in the gut with a stun round, dropping him quickly.

Another two came at him and he pulled a chair, sliding it at them and tripping them, hitting them with the butt of his pistol as they fell forwards and knocking them out.

He taunted the remaining ones by giving them a 'come at me' gesture, which prompted them to pull out guns of their own, making him smirk as he kicked a table over and hid behind it as they opened fire.

Right in the middle of the bullet hell, he stood up, all the bullets easily being dodged by him, until they all noticed something different about him.

His red eye now had a green crosshair in the middle of the pupil.

To them, he seemed to be making small movements to dodge everything at increased speeds, but to him, time had slowed to a crawl.

The joys of a semblance that slowed time around you and enhanced your marksmen abilities.

Thus, why he called it Bullet Time.

He figured he was done playing with them now, as he started shooting more stun rounds from his pistol, hitting all the ones with guns and knocking them down, and forcing the ones with close range weapons to rush him.

He chuckled as his weapon shifted into rifle form and he held it by the barrel, using the butt to club them on the head as they got near him.

Not long after, the last one fell, and he received his money plus some extra from the barman, as well as selling off the tusks, making his way out of town with 1500 lien added to his wallet.

 **(fade out song and fade screen to black)**

Four silhouettes appear in front of different colored backgrounds, in order of Navy Blue, Sky Blue, Yellow, and Magenta, under each were letters that spelled out SBLE.

The first silhouette became colored in, showing the young man with his back facing the screen and looking back over his shoulder while his rifle rested over his other shoulder.

The screen then glitches out to show a simple message.

 _See you next Demo_

* * *

 **If it isn't obvious, Snipe's hair is dyed.**

 **Anyway, I kept out the rider elements as much as possible, but I still hope you enjoyed this small trailer people.**

 **As for what was going on, well that'll be explained some other time.**

 **See ya next time!**


	2. Brave Trailer

**Time for Trailer 2!**

 **We're checking in on Brave!**

* * *

In Atlas, a section of the largest town was found in poor condition.

Buildings were in poor condition, electricity was out, no warmth was present, and there were tons of snow in the street.

This was also the section of town populated by Faunus, that wanted to be forgotten by those higher up, and by the Schnee Dust Company.

But... some people, aren't so bad.

As was proven by a young man with short brown hair, a handsome face with sky blue eyes, wearing sky blue button up shirt, a black tie, and black pants with work boots and a white long coat over it all, walking into the part of town, and with some help, started setting up a table, and handing out food and clothes to the people, as well as offering medical help.

"Try to be more careful next time." he said with a soft smile to a bear faunus girl as he put a band-aid on her scrapped knee, to which she nodded and smiled brightly as he gave her a lollipop.

He stood up, helping even more people, before they were... interupted.

"What's a human doing here?" a coyote faunus sneered as he neered the area, wearing the mark of the White Fang on his back.

"They aren't welcome around these parts." said a skunk faunus in agreement as the ones that were being helped were steping away in fear.

Not everyone took their condition lying down, and some took out their frustrations in... different ways.

The young man threw a look at the White Fang supporters "If you're here for food and clothing there's plenty to go around, same for medical treatment."

The supporters either scoffed or laughed in his face.

"You think we want the shit that a human would hand out? Man you might want to take your head out of the clouds if you think you're so high and mighty!" the leader of the supporters said with a smirk that would infuriate people.

Though it didn't faze the young man, who set his face into a cold look "Then I suppose I need to take out the trash." he said as he threw off his coat, and the sound of a blade being unsheathed was heard, before the coat fell down to show him wielding a saber in hand that a somewhat bulky guard in which were housed two dust cannisters, fire, and ice.

 **(Play Crossing Field by LiSA)**

His readyness to fight seemed to throw them off, giving him an oppurtunity to activate the fire dust in his blade and send out a wave of flames at them, hitting a few and making the rest scatter and roll in the snow to put out the fire that had caught on their clothing.

"If you're just going to waste my time then get out of here." the young man said, before blocking a bullet with his blade, glaring at the attacker who gulped in fear.

"Get him you idiots!" the leader shouted at them, as they all started to rush him.

The young man sighed as he started fighting back, shifting the element of his blade to ice and freezing over his opponents one by one.

The leader tried to find a way to beat the young man, grinning as he spotted his key to victory.

The young man ducked under an axe before stabbing the grunt, encasing his chest in ice and making him fall over from the weight, before slashing along the ground and sending a wave of ice spikes towards another grunt.

"If you people are supporting the White Fang, than stopping their overzealous actions should be simple." the young man said in a taunt, holding back a smirk as he saw it worked and angered them.

He knew how people worked, he had to in his line of work after all, so he had a good understanding on how to make a person angry.

He stopped when he heard a small yelp however, making him turn around and narrow his eyes in anger.

The leader of the White Fang supporters was using the little girl he'd treated as hostage, holding a gun to her head while the girl had tears at her eyes in fear, he also saw the girl's mother look on in fear and worry.

"If you don't want to see this girl's brains on the snow, then you won't move from that spot, got that?!" the leader said with a mad grin.

"Don't move from this spot? I can do that." the young man said as he faced the leader fully, raising his sword.

"And no dust too!" the leader added.

The young man shrugged as he deactivated the dust, his blade still held up "It won't save you."

The leader was angered, as he lifted up the child and used her as a human shield "Whatever you do, you'll have to go through her, could you live with yourself if you did that? I bet you can't!" he said condescendingly.

The young man breathed in and out slowly "I won't hit her, I will only cut that which I need to cut, as a surgeon should." he said as the blade was held high, before it was brought down in a swift motion.

Nothing seemed to happen for a moment, before the leader shouted in pain as he dropped the child and grasped his chest, which had a massive cut going across it.

The other thugs stepped away in shock and a bit of fear at that "H-how did he...?"

"He was withing my range." the young man said before looking at them "And so are all of you."

His words had the desired effect, making them run away in fear.

 **(fade out song)**

The young man picked up his coat, putting it back on as he put his blade back in it's sheath, strapped to the inside of his coat for now.

He helped the young girl get back up with a soft smile "Are you ok?" he asked her, to which she nodded with a bright smile before she hugged, surprising him before he returned it with a smile.

He lifted her up as he handed her back to her mother, who thanked him deeply (and he may be wrong but she may have also flirted with him a bit, but he chose to ignore it, he wasn't into older women).

After that, he continued to help those in need.

It was a lesson he kept close to his heart, even years later.

 **(fade out image)**

The silhouettes appear once more, this time the sky blue one being filled in and showing the young man from just now, stabbing his blade into the ground and resting both of his hands on it's pommel with a calm look on his face.

The screen once more glitched out, being replaced with the same message.

 _See you next Demo_

* * *

 **And there we go!**

 **Yeah, I'm not explaining his semblance just yet.**

 **Snipe was straightforward, so I explained it, but Brave is a bit more complicated.**

 **Also, as you've seen, while Snipe looked like his rider form, Brave doesn't.**

 **It's mostly because, I'm repeating myself but, Snipe dyed his hair.**

 **Anyway, hope you enjoyed this trailer and are looking forward to the next one.**

 **Don't forget to leave a review!**


	3. Lazer Trailer

**Hey guys welcome to the third trailer.**

 **Nothing much to say here, so let's go.**

 **Although oh my god it's like this one was cursed because it kept getting pushed back when I started it this weekend.**

* * *

We find ourselves in a city in Vacuo, filled with sand, yet the people could live easily with it.

Near the outskirts of the city, what appeared to be a motorcross race was being set up.

A lot of the bikes looked modified or hastily put together from scrap metal, save for one.

The bike's frame was a pale yellow in color, with white and magenta highlights, and imprinted on it's side in icy blue was the word LAZER. The wheels were custom made, all-terrain, yet still looked like normal motorcross wheels. The exhaust pipes at the back seemed slightly oversized as well.

The owner of the bike was leaning against it, wearing a motorcross jacket with the same colors and and design as his bike, the word LAZER on his back, although it was somewhat covered by the pair of sickles hanging off his back, which seemed to be able to take an alternate form. He wore black motorcycle gloves on his hands, black bike pants with knee pads sown into them (his jacket also had padding sown in), and a pair of white and yellow sneakers. His hair was brown and raised up in a fauxhawk style, while his eyes were brown as well. Under one of his arms was a helmet in the same colors as his bike and jacket.

All around him where hushed whispers and murmurs, all about him.

"You mean you don't recognize him? He's the rising star, the guy's been tearing through the underground circuit, said he wants to beat the wannabes before going pro."

"Nobody even knows his name, they can't even tell where he's from, they just know he's been all over the place."

"He's apparently always talking in this weird language, no one can recognize it."

He didn't pay attention to them though, as he muttered to himself under his breath, in said weird language. (subtitles incoming, the next lines are spoken in chinese)

" _99 races won so far, today will be number 100, after that I should make my way to Vale, Beacon should be starting soon and he said I had to be there."_

Soon he heard the others mention that it was starting soon, making him put on his helmet and get on his bike as he tightened his gloves, the other racers getting in position.

He was not surprised that it was one of the cliche street races when a girl walked up in front of the bikes, holding a pair of white flags.

"Just get on with it." he muttered as he revved the engine of his bike, making a low roar come from it.

As soon as the girl dropped the flags, he gave his bike one powerful rev, letting out a mighty roar as he sped forwards while popping a wheelie, his competition having jumped from the sudden sound.

 **(Play INNOCENCE by Eir Aoi)**

Mere moments after he sped off the other racers took off, trying to catch up to him.

He smirked as he looked over his shoulder, before grabbing one of his sickles and using it to break an old wodden watch tower as he passed by it, making it fall down and impeding their path.

Oh yeah, the author forgot to mention it was _that_ kind of race.

He chuckled to himself as he continued to speed along, un-hindered for the moment.

Then about a minute later he heard the others starting to catch up to him.

He quickly ducked his head low as he heard something fly over his head, making him glance up to see a beer bottle.

Ok, he may have pissed them off with that stunt from earlier.

'Oh well.' he thought with a grin as he grabbed a sickle and flicked his wrist, making it change around itself, soon adopting the form of a chakram, which he spun in his hand before throwing it backwards, hittin the front tire of one of the other racers and making him get flung off his bike as he lost control of it, before the chakram returned to his hand.

This continued in a similar fashion until they sped out of the outskirts of town and into the shifting sands around it.

He sped over a dune, jumping off it's edge, right over a dog sized Deathstalker which stopped to look at him in confusion, before scurrying away when the other racers cleared the dune, except they didn't jump it, and one or two swerved out as they tried to avoid the Deathstalker.

The race continued on through the desert sands, until a rumble was felt underneath the dunes and pits.

He narrowed his eyes as he hovered his fingers over a trigger on his handlebar, waiting for the right moment.

Suddenly, the sands a few meters in front of him burst upwards, soon revealing a monstrous grimm.

The beast could best be described as a huge black sandworm with a gaping maw full of razor sharp teeth.

"Ah, that's why it's called a Pitmaw." he mumbled to himself as did a full 180 before reaching it, the rear end of it's bike facing it's maw as it surged forth "Open wide!" he called out as he hit the trigger on his handlebar, letting a jet of flames shoot out from his exhaust pipes and into it's pit of teeth, making it writhe in pain before tunneling back down under the sands as he sped back off towards the town.

He passed by the dumbfounded racers, laughing to himself as they started swearing and soon spun around in a vain effort to catch up to him.

One did, however...

" _Buzz off."_ he bit out (in chinese) as he kicked the racer's bike away, making him crash into a dune.

As it was, he reached back the finish line with no problems, grabbing his prize on the fly by before speeding off.

 **(fade out song and screen)**

The silhouettes return once more, this time the one in yellow also being filled in, showing the young racer with a sickle in hand while he was sitting on his bike, grinning all the while.

The screen, once again, glitched out, showing the familiar message.

 _See you next Demo_

* * *

 **Finally done with this!**

 **Jesus this took me a while to get to.**

 **So, yeah, a street racer is our third team member.**

 **Not much else to say.**

 **See you at the last trailer!**


	4. Ex-Aid Trailer and ?

**Here's another one people, the last team member of the riders!**

 **Enjoy, and yes, I'm getting back into the swing of things.**

* * *

A young man was walking down a sidewalk in Vale.

He wore neon green sneakers with black highlights, black pants, wearing a magenta colored canvas hooded jacket, the hood drawn up and shadowing his face, the color on his jacket was broken up by a few black lines zig-zagging on it. His hands, which were covered in black gloves, where in his pockets as he walked along, looking to be deep in thought, a grey cylinder like object hanging off his belt loop on his pants.

He perked up when he heard a scream, which was quickly cut off with a shout of "Shut up!".

He scowled underneath his hood as he heard that, figuring out what was going on.

He turned to the direction of the shout, his legs and feet flashing for a moment before he sped off in a blur of movement.

His hood only mooved barely, showing he had a pair of goggle covering his eyes underneath.

When he reached the scene of the attack, he jumped off the ground a bit, coming out of his burst of speed with a kick that bowled over a thug that was attemtping to rob a woman and her son.

There were 3 more besides him, and all of them looked at the young man, stunned.

He turned to the woman "Get out of here! I'll hold them off!" he said, the woman nodding and thanking him before picking up her son and running away.

He then turned back to the thugs, pulling back his hood, showing his double colored hair.

It had both orange and teal colors, though at the moment the bangs were shifted in a way that made more orange visible compared to the teal, though the roots of his hair was brown, just like his eyes.

He lowered the goggles, giving the thugs that were still conscious a cold look "You guys chose the wrong person to mess with. I'll beat you up with No Continues."

 **(Play Just Fly Away by EDGE of LIFE)**

Unsurprisingly, his manner of announcing his victory pissed them off as they rushed him.

He smirked as he tensed his legs, before jumping up, once more stunning them as he jumped high, then seemed to jump again towards a nearby wall.

As far as semblances went, his had to be the strangest one of all.

When his feet touched the wall, he kicked off it back down towards the thugs, grabbing the cylinder on his waist and pushing a button as he unhooked it, producing an orange blade of energy from the hilt, which he used to cut up the weapons they had on them, smirking slightly as he saw their dumbfounded looks.

He quickly deactivated his blade as he stored it away, before delivering an anscending palm strike to the jaw of the closest thug, sending him spiraling dizzily for a few moments, before he started to punch and kick the other two.

He ducked and weaved around their attacks, striking back at their joints or at their gut, and when the other other one got his head back in the game, he was still able to fend all three off at the same time.

Let's just say there weren't very impressive to him.

"Game Over for you punks." he said calmly as he dropped down and spin kicked their legs out from underneath them before jumping a few feet away from them.

At the same time, a gust of wind blew his hair in the other direction, showing more teal than orange.

He tensed his legs, before shooting forwards and kicking all three square in the chest at high speeds.

He slowly put his leg down on the ground, before grinning as all three of them fell down on their backs, knocked out all because of the strength of the blow.

"Kaishin no Ippatsu." he muttered to himself with the same grin. (literally means 'One shot of Satisfaction')

He then walked away from the scene, taking out his scroll at the same time.

 **(fade out song and screen)**

The silhouettes appear one last time, with the final one being filled in and showing the young man from just now, holdng up a handheld game with a grin.

The screen then glitched out, starting to show the usual message, before glitching further.

* * *

The scene now showed an office in a corporate building, with a man standing in front of the large glass window that overlooked the city of Vale.

Various cutouts and posters of video games were hanging in different places of his office.

The man in question wore a typical business outfit with a dark purple tie.

His hair was two toned, mostly being black with a streak of white in the left side. His left eye was sky blue, while his right was ruby red.

"Everything is starting to fall into place. The boys will soon be in Beacon, and we'll be able to handle the situation." the man said as he turned to his desk, eyeing the objects on it.

Several objects that looked like game cartridges, though he focused on a purple one that featured a small character in black with red eyes and purple gloves and boots, the title of the game being MIGHTY ACTION X, though there was a similar cartidge with the same title, except in magenta, with the character being magenta colored with orange eyes and green gloves and boots.

He picked up the purple cartridge, holding it up to eye level "Soon, the games shall begin." he said, his lips twitching upwards in a smile.

"PAPA!"

And then the sinister atmosphere was completely dashed by the voice of a young woman calling out to him and he suddenly bent forward as someone climbed onto his back.

His face became the perfect definition of deadpan, as he looked over his shoulder "Poppy, don't you think you're getting a bit old for this?"

The person on his back was a young woman with short bubblegum pink hair in a bob cut, dressed as if she was ready to perform on stage for a concert with a frully yellow and white dress with pink and green highlights and a small green and yellow hat on her head, her pink eyes appearing to always have happiness in them.

She tapped her chin thoughtfully, before smiling "Nope! Still fun to do!"

The man sighed, before smiling a bit as she finally got off his back and he sat down.

"You know what to do?" he asked her seriously, yet with a small smile.

She adopted a serous face and saluted him "Yes sir!" she said, before giggling a bit.

He nodded, smirking slightly "Perfect then."

 **(fade out image)**

"The Bugster won't know what hit them."

The screen glitched out finally, showing a new message.

 _New Game Start_

* * *

 **And we're done!**

 **Oh yeah, this wasn't just the trailer for Ex-Aid, it was also the trailer for Genmu... and trust me, there will be plenty of moments like those in the story.**

 **Believe me when I say the story will shock you often.**

 **Also, for those who follow some of my other stories, keep quiet on the secret, you know what I'm talking about.**


	5. Level 0

**LET'S GAME! METCHA GAME! MUTCHA GAME! WHAT'S YOUR NAME?!**

 **I'M A KAMEN RIDER.**

* * *

 _Earth, Japan_

In an arcade center in the middle of Shibuya, a crowd of young adults and teenagers were all looking at a certain machine in awe.

It was a DDR machine, and one person was playing on it, perfectly at that.

It was a young man, wearing a magenta colored canvas hoodie with zig-zagging black stripes on it, the hood down, showing his two toned hair in orange and teal, though it was currently styled to show more teal, under the hoodie he wore a simple black shirt, his pants were black, and his shoes were green with black highlights, finally, hanging around his neck were a pair of goggles, and his eyes were green colored.

The song he was dancing to was known as EXCITE by Daichi Miura, and he wasn't missing a single beat.

As the last note passed, he held the final pose, his hand pointed upwards in a closed fist, before the results screen was show, giving him a perfect score.

The others who were all watching started clapping their hands and cheering, making him turn around with a grin and do a short bow before he soon left the arcade, walking down a street.

He kept on walking for a good while, soon reaching an empty street and using it as a shortcut.

Or at least, that was his plan, until he heard someone clapping behind him, making him turn around to see a man with mostly black hair with a stripe of white on the left side of his head, his left eyes was sky blue, and his right was blood red, while he wore a normal business suit with a purple tie.

"I have to admit Mr. Plaiy, you are as impressive as they say." the man said with a smile as he stepped forward slightly.

The young man rose an eyebrow at him "Who are you supposed to be?"

The man bowed slightly "My name is Chroma Prisma, and I'm in need of your assistance, Retsu Plaiy."

The now named Retsu blinked in confusion "What do you need my help for Chroma-san?"

Chroma stood up straight again "It's a matter that requires your skills with videogames."

Retsu was even more confused now "Seriously?"

Chroma nodded "Indeed, I require that you come with me to help, you should know however that it shall be permanent."

Retsu's face became angry at hearing that last part "Are you saying I can't see my parents again if I accept?"

"That's exactly what I'm saying, however, you should know that at the same time, should you accept, you technically won't leave either." Chroma said cryptically.

Retsu's face became blank as he tried to understand that "What?"

"I have... friends, in high places, who would be able to make it so you both leave and don't leave at the same time." Chroma explained.

"How would they do that?" Retsu asked in confusion.

Chroma, instead of answering, whistled as he looked up at the sky, seemingly waiting for something, Retsu looking up confused "What are we waiting for?" he said.

Except his voice came from next to him.

Slowly, he turned his head, seeing a double of himself standing next to him, the double seemed to catch on as well, and looked back at the original, both of them utterly shocked.

Chroma chuckled, bringing them out of their confusion "That's what we were waiting for, now, know that the other you is a perfect copy of you, thus it'll be like you never left. Basically, either one of you could come though, it won't matter, since one is staying and the other is leaving."

The two Retsu's looked at each other, silently debating, before the original turned back to Chroma and nodded, the clone nodding at the original as he started walking, understanding he was simply going to continue his life like normal.

Chroma nodded thankfully "Good, I'm glad you agreed to come. You should know there will be 3 others present as well."

Retsu tilted his head "3 other gamers?"

Chroma smirked "Something like that."

Any further talking was stopped as Chroma turned and started to walk, Retsu following him.

"So, where are we going then?" Retsu asked.

"Have you ever heard of Remnant?" Chroma asked him.

Retsu looked up in thought, before looking back at Chroma "No, I haven't."

"I need your help there, I'll explain more once we're in my office." Chroma said, reaching into his suit and pulling something out that made Retsu's eyes widen.

It looked like a video game cartridge, shaped in a manner like a grip with a button on the side and a large transparent piece sticking out of it.

"A gashat? From Ex-Aid?" Retsu said in confusion.

He'd seen the first 10 or so episodes of Ex-Aid, which included the death of one of the main characters, but beyond that, he took a break from it since his studies had started back up, today he had been celebrating being out of class for the coming month and then he was going to catch up to the series.

"Not a normal gashat though." Chroma said as he pushed the button on it, the blank gashat only producing the normal activation sound, before Chroma threw it forward, and it sparked before exploding and... generating a portal.

Retsu stared at it blankly for a few moments "What."

"I know it's rather strange, but I had to follow a theme." Chroma muttered, with Retsu nodding in acceptance to the explanation.

With that said, the two of them stepped through the portal, which closed moments later.

* * *

Retsu stood in Chroma's office, looking around everywhere, his hair now showing more orange than teal, and being ever so wary.

He didn't know at first that he was stepping into another world, nor did he know that the man he was talking to was the CEO of a company in this other world.

A company known as Genmu Corporation, the biggest video game distributor, period.

The reason he was wary was due to the role the CEO of Genmu played in Ex-Aid, which was as one of the villains.

While Chroma was clearly different from the vile man that was Kuroto Dan, he was still on his guard.

It payed to be cautious after all.

Something which was clearly followed by the other 3 people Chroma had mentionned earlier.

And Retsu recognized all of them, after all, the three of them, plus himself, were all famous back on Earth.

Natt Jeger, a Norwegian hunter who was apparently able to track down any target, and he'd even assisted in police affairs by acting as their sniper. He had dark blue hair with a neon green bang covering his right eye, which was a ruby red just like his exposed left eye. He was wearing a navy blue sleeveless vest over a black shirt with white stripes on it, dark green cargo pants and black boots, apparently he'd been dragged away from a hunt if his forest camo cloak was anything to go by.

Edler Ritter, an up and coming young German surgeon, he was also the heir to an old and large pharmaceutical company. His hair was a light brown with sky blue eyes, and according to many young (and older) women, he was one of the most handsome men ever... even though he was only 16. He wore a sky blue button up shirt with a black tie and dark blue dress pants with dress shoes, along with wearing a white doctor's coat.

Ai Sudu, a Chinese motorcross champion, he'd never lost a single race, and he'd been racing since he was 11, currently being 16. His hair was dark brown in a fauxhawk style, with dark brown eyes. He wore a simple yellow and white motorcross jacket with a pair of jeans and sneakers.

As for Chroma, he was sitting down at his desk which was right in front of a window that overlooked a city, apparently called Vale, and the Genmu Corp. building was apparently one of the tallest in the city.

Scattered around the office were several cutouts and posters of a variety of games, a lot of which Retsu could recognize, including just about every game from Earth, and the ones from Ex-Aid.

Super Mario, Legend of Zelda, Metroid, Pokemon, Kirby, Sonic, Final Fantasy, Shin Megami Tensei, and so many others.

As for games from Ex-Aid, he could see Mighty Action X, Taddle Quest, Bang Bang Shooting, Bakusou Bike, Gekitotsu Robots, Doremifa Beat, Jet Combat, Girigiri Chambara, Shakariki Sports, Drago Knight Hunter Z, as well as posters for games to come, like Dangerous Zombie and another called Mighty Brothers XX, which back on Earth he had started hearing the name before leaving, but he didn't know what it did exactly. There was also a few games he figured appeared later in the series that he didn't know about, such as Perfect Puzzle, and one set to release later in the year called Tokimeki Crisis.

But then there was posters of things not related to games, such as cartoons.

He could see posters for Lion King, The Little Mermaid, Mulan, Hercules, basically every Disney movie ever, almost like Genmu Corp. had made the movies.

Which, might be possible, for all he knew Remnant didn't have these movies, or all of the well known video games.

He turned his attention back to Chroma when the man cleared his throat.

"Now that we're all here, it's time I explained what exactly I need your help with." Chroma said as he stood up and started walking.

"Several years ago I started this company with two goals in mind. The first, bring the wonder of video games to Remnant. The second, serve as a frontline for events to come. But, a third goal sprung suddenly one day, by pure concidence." he said, as he turned to look at the four boys.

"Stopping the Bugsters." he said, and Retsu's eyes grew wide, while the other 3 were mostly confused.

"One day, I was working on a new game when... something, I'm still not quite sure what, happened, it cause the first Bugster Virus to form." he said grimly.

"I've been working day and night to prevent massive outbreaks as much as I can since that day, including funding a special hospital wing to try and stabilise victims of the virus and informing me of the issue, as up to now, I was the only one suited to performing the operation to remove a Bugster from a human host." Chroma said as he looked out the window in the room.

"Why did you need us, exactly? How can we help?" Natt questioned.

"By taking on the same mantle I have... as a Kamen Rider." Chroma answered.

Retsu's jaw dropped in shock at those words.

"You won't be able to help just yet, as your gear isn't fully ready, but within the next year, everything will be in place." Chroma said as he went back to his desk.

"Why next year?" Edler asked with a raised eyebrow, a part of him wondering why he couldn't help patients for a year.

"Because next year, you four will enter Beacon Academy, a school to train warriors." Chroma explained simply.

The four boys blinked in confusion, with Ai asking everyone's question "Why will we do that?"

"Because you'll need the extra training it'll give in regards to the creatures of Grimm, another enemy we have to deal with along with the Bugsters. Trust me, their just as dangerous." Chroma said.

"Well, I guess that's good to know, what will we do for now then?" Retsu asked, the others nodding, wanting to know as well.

Chroma turned back to them, smiling "You four will be exploring Remnant, getting acustomed to it's culture, in the mean time, I'll be preparing everything you'll need. But before you leave, I'll be teaching you a few basics as well as helping you make weapons for yourselves."

"Weapons are allowed here?" Natt asked surprised.

"Indeed, in fact, several people carry around a side arm to defend themselves in case of grimm attacks. Now, there is one thing you should know about weapons here, they are what is know as Mechashift weapons, capable of taking at least two different forms, for example, a sword which is also a gun." Chroma explained easily.

Natt raised his hand "Could I have a gun that turns into another gun?"

Chroma blinked, before chuckling a bit "About time someone asked for that one."

"Before I forget, why us specifically?" Ai asked, wondering why they were the ones chosen.

Chroma smirked, about to answer, before an alarm went off "Seems you get to see why. Come on." he said, walking towards an elevator, the boys following him.

When they were halfway down the tower, the elevator stopped, opening to let in a young woman who was a few years older than them, wearing a women's business suit with a skirt that reached a bit above her knees, with dark brown hair pulled back and pink eyes.

"What's the issue Spring?" Chroma asked.

The young woman, identified as Spring, brought up what the boys thought was an I-pad, but it was actually a scroll expanded to tablet size "A fully formed group of grunt bugsters, thankfully there's no patient this time, they formed from a damaged TV downtown." she explained, before turning her head to look at the boys "The ones you chose father?"

Tha caused the four boys to go wide eyed and look between the two, Chroma smirking and Spring smiling in amusement at their reaction, before focusing back on the task at hand "Indeed. Now, how many of them?" Chroma answered his daughter before asking a question.

"Not too many, this should be over quickly." Spring said as the elevator opened on the parking lot.

Chroma quickly walked towards a black motorcycle with purple highlights, while Spring made the boys follow her to a jeep which they all got in and started following after the bike after Chroma put a helmet on.

The boys quickly tied their seatbelts as Spring floored it.

"I'm pretty sure she's breaking several laws right now." Edler said as he gripped his seat.

"That and she's trying to kill us!" Natt said through grit teeth as they were rocked around the backseats while Spring kept up with her father.

"Hey doc I ain't feeling so well." Retsu said dizzily as his eyes were replaced by swirls and his hair was shifted back to mostly teal.

"Great, the expert player hit his head." Ai said as he put an arm around Retsu to try and stop that from happening again.

Due to the speed at which Spring was driving, they arrived at the scene quickly, right behind Chroma as he rammed his bike into one of the bugsters, sending it flying into the group and pushing them all down.

He did a simple look around the area, nodding to himself when he saw everyone had cleared out, the boys and Spring getting out of the jeep with Ai helping Retsu to stand as he was still slightly dizzy.

He took off his helmet, before reaching into his coat and pulling a large green blocky object with a mgenta colored lever and panel on it, strapping it to his waist and making a belt wrap around him, with a green slot on the left side that had two orange holders attached to it.

"What's that?" Edler asked, curious about the item.

"Gamer Driver." Retsu and Spring answered at the same time, looking at each other before Retsu let Spring do it "It allows a person to harness the powers of a gashat, father has been fine tuning it for years now, including working on the gashats themselves, reducing the risk they would normally incorporate."

"Risk?" Ai asked as he let Retsu stand on his own now.

"Originally, the gashat would inject the user with the buster virus, father knows this because of simulations and tests run, he wanted to avoid that as much as possible, as such, he worked on it for years, until it reached it's current state, not requiring to inject the user with the bugster virus, and even giving them an immunization to the virus. The biggest thing he worked out was the damage caused by his own prototype gashat, which he has reduced to null and void, although at first whenever he untransformed he would nearly collapse, that was how great the strain was on his body." Spring further explained, frowing as she remembered the damage her father used to do to his body back during his first few years as Kamen Rider.

Reaching his hand to one of his coat pockets, he pulled out a purple gashat with MIGHTY ACTION X written on it with a black mascot character with red eyes and purple gloves and shoes.

Wordlessly, he pressed the button the gashat.

 **"MIGHTY ACTION X!"**

The game called out as the start-up screen appeared behind Chroma while a wave of pixels sweeped over the surrounding area and brown blocks flew out of the screen, scattering around everywhere.

He then spun the gashat around his finger before holding it above the first slot on the Gamer Driver.

"Henshin, Grade 2"

He said, quickly inserting the gashat and pulling the lever, which pulled back the magenta plaque, showing the other side to read Gamer Driver, and that a small window was in the middle of the belt.

 **"GASHATTO! GACHAN! LEVEL UP! MIGHTY JUMP! MIGHTY KICK! MIGH~TY ACTIO~N X!"**

A holographic screen jumped out of the glass on the belt, moving back towards Chroma and passing over him, generating an armor on him in a rush of purple pixels.

The pixels quickly cleared away, revealing his form.

The undersuit was black with dark purple lines running up on it, the chest piece was a gunmetal grey color, featuring a screen on it that showed four buttons like on a controller on the right side, and on the left side was a pair of gauges, one designated with a small AP (Aura Points) and the other with HP (Health Points), beneath the two gauges were a pair of icons that showed two weapons, a laser blaster and a chainsaw. The shoulder pads were a metallic purple color, and on the legs and arms were purple rings. Plates in a gunmetal grey covered the front of his lower legs, his knees, the back of his forearms, and the back of his hands. The wrists were the same metallic purple as the shoulders, along with the hands being black. The feet were purple in color with black highlights. As for the helmet, the jaw was a gunmetal grey, while a pair of red eyes with white pupils were on the middle of the face surrounded by a pair of goggles, between the goggles and the jaw was a thin purple stripe. The most striking feature of the helmet however would have to be the four strands of black spiky hair sticking up and angling towards the left.

"Due to the arrival of new players on the board, I think my name deserves an extension to avoid confusion, from now on, I am Kamen Rider Genmu." he said as some kind of inventory floated around him with a single item in it, the item appearing on his right hand.

 **"GASHACON BUGVISOR!"**

The object looked like a purple pad with a screen in the middle, and two large buttons, a red A and a purple B, there also seemed to be some kind of slot with a red arrow on it and a small button on the side. However, the main features were obviously the dual laser pistols on the side with the A button and the chainsaw on the side with the B button.

"Time to get rid of you pests." Genmu said as he pulled off the Bugvisor from the handle he was holding it on, flipping it around to put the laser blaster on the front with a sound of **"CHU DON!"** before opening fire on the simple enough orange skinned minor bigster viruses.

"So, what does all of this have to do with us?" Natt asked as he overlooked the battle and the area.

"The four of you have shown to excel in specific areas that match up perfectly with certain gashats, as well, your own personal skills would be helpful, as a hunter, a doctor, a racer, and a gamer." Spring explained.

"So, I'm guessing that the certain gashats you're talking about, mine is like a racing game?" Ai asked knowingly.

Spring nodded "Precisely. Retsu's gashat is the full release of father's one, Edler's is a fantasy RPG, and Natt's is a shooting game."

Retsu suddenly pointed at everyone as he started speaking, first pointing at Natt "Snipe," then at Edler "Brave," then at Ai "Lazer," and finally himself "Ex-Aid."

"Those will be your Rider names yes." Spring said with a nod, not surprised that Retsu knew.

Back to the fight, the bugsters were so weak that a few shots were enough to destroy them, however, there were quite a few of them, so this was still a task that could take a while.

Unless of course he had a secret weapon... which he did.

He grabbed the Bugvisor again and flipped it back to the chainsaw with a sound of **"GYU IN!"** as he ran towards the bugster, before pressing the A button, making the chainsaw blade start to spin quickly before slashing it across a portion of the bugster group destroying them quickly, followed by him pressing the B button for a slightly powered up strike that destroyed two more.

As he gazed at the remaining bugsters, he grabbed his gashat from his belt before moving it to the green slot on his side, pressing the silver button attached to it.

 **"KIMEWAZA!"**

A sound like perpetually charging energy started to come from the gashat, as Genmu once more switched he bugvisor to laser blaster mode, the energy travelling from the gashat, across his body, and into the bugvisor, which started to gather the energy at the tip of the blasters, before Genmu once more hit the silver button, his eyes shining at the same time.

 **"MIGHTY CRITICAL STRIKE!"**

The energy released from the blaster tips, destroying the remaining bugsters in a concentrated beam burst.

Once he was sure the Bugsters were gone, he removed the gashat from the Kimewaza slot and closed the Driver back up, ending the transformation as the brown blocks disappeared.

* * *

Later, they had returned to the Genmu Corp. building, with Chroma and Spring sending off the four boys in Remnant after finishing their weapons, a magnum/sniper rifle for Natt, a saber that could use both fire and ice for Edler, a pair of chakrams that could turn into sickles for Ai, along with a new motorcycle, and a special cylinder that reacted to one's aure to create a weapon for Retsu.

Chroma knew that Retsu didn't fully trust him yet, but hopefully, that would come with time.

"You didn't tell them everything." Spring said plainly as she sat in front of her father in his office.

"No, that's too big for them right now. We'll start by getting them accustomed to everything before we make that little hunt begin." Chroma said, sighing as he rubbed his forehead.

"Why didn't you tell them about the 5th gamer though?" Spring asked as she looked at the _five_ gashats placed on her fathers's desk.

The first four were the magenta colored MIGHTY ACTION X, the cyan colored TADDLE QUEST, the navy colored BANG BANG SHOOTING, and the yellow colored BAKUSOU BIKE.

The fifth however, was ocean blue, and the sticker read PERFECT PUZZLE, with the mascot being a small blue blob with a serious face.

"That's because I was hoping we could recover the stolen data quickly to give the fifth gamer his full strength." Chroma then sighed before smiling in amusement "But it looks like ArcKnightX5 is going to have to be patient for his full strength, hopefully half his power will be enough to help us retrieve the data for KNOCK-OUT FIGHTER and the other stolen beta gashats."

"TADDLE LEGACY, BANG BANG TANK, BAKUSOU FORMULA, TOXIC UNDEAD, and HURRICANE NINJA, right?" Spring listed off the remaining stolen data.

"They also stole data on the Bugvisor, and, I fear, they may have gotten some notes I had hidden away for a game I had planned on releasing after the whole Bugster mess was over." Chroma said with a groan.

Spring looked a bit pale, since if her father wanted to avoid that game releasing during the bugster crisis, than it could only be dangerous "What's the game?"

He looked up at her "KAMEN RIDER CHRONICLE... and I fear _he_ has his hands on it."

* * *

 _Undisclosed location_

"Graphite, I have a mission for you." spoke a young man's voice as he was hidden in the shadows.

"And that mission would be?" spoke a dragon like creature with green scales, a dragon head on his left shoulder, a double sides bone sword hanging off his back, and an orange right arm.

"Bring more of our kind forth." spoke the young man as he threw something at Graphite, who caught it before eyeing it.

It looked eerily like the Bugvisor, except it was missing the slot for a gashat and the glass in the middle.

Graphite nodded as he held the Bugvisor MOD in his hand, taking a knee and bowing to the shadowed young man "It shall be done my lord, I will look for the perfect place to begin cultivating the virus to breed more of our kind."

"I know you will, however, I am sending someone to help oversee your actions." the young man spoke, as another person stepped forward and out of the shadows.

It was a man with purple hair and red eyes, wearing torn up clothing in various colors of purple, green and black.

"Tox." Graphite greeted with a nod.

"Let's see just how good you are Graphite." Tox said with his own nod.

"Weren't you sending Nin to look after him my lord?" asked an authorative voice from the shadows.

"Originally yes, but I found a much better job for him." the young man said, amusement clear in his voice.

"Well, I guess I prefer Tox to Nin anyway." Graphite said, earning a smirk from Tox as the two made to leave.

"Do remember your disguise Graphite." spoke a regal sounding voice from the shadows.

"And the lord didn't tell you to leave just yet." added another voice somewhat quickly.

Graphite grumbled under his breath, before taking on the appearance of a young man with green hair, wearing a grey shirt with a green right sleeve and a red long coat with only a left sleeve on it, a necklace with three large fangs hanging off it around his neck, before he turned back to the shadows "My apologies my lord, I was eager to begin bolstering our ranks." he said as he bowed.

"It's fine, now, as for the other matter, I want you to find someone compatible with this, our little pet just finished it." the young man's voice said, before they threw something which Tox caught this time.

It was a firey red gashat, with the sticker for KNOCK-OUT FIGHTER on it.

"It might take some time, but we shall make sure to find a compatible user my lord." Graphite said as Tox stored the gashat.

"That's fine, somehow I suspect that the perfect candidate will show up in a year's time anyway." somehow, even through the shadows, it was possible to tell the young man was grinning "And time is something we have plenty of." his statement was punctuated by the sound of a clock ticking away behind him.

* * *

 **Woah man that's a big prologue!**

 **I seriously did not expect being able to make it so huge, but I'm proud of myself.**

 **And we have quite a few mysteries already, mostly concerning the stolen gashats data.**

 **I hope you all enjoyed the prologue, and I'll see you all in the next level!**


	6. Level 1

**Greetings and salutations my beautiful people and welcome to the ca- PFFHAHAHAHA I'm sorry I just had to!**

 **But, for real though, welcome back to Gamer Hunters, and I hope my fellow Caddicarus fans appreciated that little opening zinger.**

 **Anyway, before we head in, a few things to say.**

 **One, I hope everyone enjoyed the end of THOR, and to quell you worries, yes, there is more to come, something I've said many times, a few sequels are planned along with alternate versions of the story.**

 **Two, Gamer Hunters along with a few other stories will be prioritized above the THOR sequels for a good little while.**

 **2.5, yes, chapters in Gamer Hunters are all going to be called Levels, and no they don't have anything to do with the plot, it's just a gimmick.**

 **Three, expect more new stories to be posted within the next month, I won't say what they are or if they are in the priority list though.**

 **Four, before you throw suggestions at me for Build, I already know what I'll eventually cross him over with, and yes, I'm as hyped as everyone else for the final Heisei Rider.**

 **Anyway, without further ado...**

 **GAME START!**

* * *

A young girl was taking several deep breaths as she stood on an airship. She had short black hair with red tips and silver eyes, wearing a dark outfit in shades of black and red that included a skirt, and the most striking feature being a hooded cape, while hanging off her hip was a blocky weapon.

Her name was Ruby Rose, and she was nervous because she'd just been let into Beacon two years early.

Standing close to her was a taller blonde girl with lilac eyes who was dressed to show off her body, looking a bit like a biker in shades of brown, yellow and orange, with golden bracelets on her wrists, which unknown to a lot of people, were her weapons.

Her name was Yang Xiao Long, older half-sister of Ruby Rose, sharing the same father but having different mothers. (though if Yang were honest, Summer Rose had been more of a mother to her than her own ever was)

She looked at her nervous little sister and reached over, pulling her into a hug and patting her back "It'll be ok Ruby, you'll do fine."

Ruby easily returned the hug. "I hope you're right."

"Trust me, I know I am." Yang said with a grin as she gave her sister a squeeze before letting her go, placing her hands on her shoulders "I hope you know how proud everyone is of you right?"

Ruby gave her sister a deadpan stare but still smiled a bit "Well, yeah, you and dad wouldn't stop talking about it all week."

"That and Uncle Qrow called and added his two cents in." Yang added, with Ruby nodding with a smile before taking one last breath and patting her cheeks.

"Ok, I think I'm good now." she said, determined to make a good first impression on anyone she ended up meeting.

Yang grinned before the two of them heard the news turn on, looking at it as it mentioned a certain robbery that was carried out the other day, with a picture of a carrot haired criminal coming onto the screen "That's the guy you fought right?" Yang asked her little sister.

Ruby shook her hand in an iffy manner "Sorta? I was fighting his goons more than him." she said, making Yang nod.

The news soon shifted to something equally serious. "Earlier this morning, another Bugster Outbreak took place, the source identified as a young woman who had been infected with Game Disease, though she has been confirmed to be cured as of an hour ago. Additionally, Genmu Corporation has made a startling announcement. Here is the footage."

The screen then showed footage of the CEO of Genmu Corporation, Chroma Prisma, standing on a podium in front of the building, talking to several reporters "Earlier today, some of you must have witnessed the man known as Kamen Rider, defeat the Bugster who appeared. Now, what you should know about Kamen Rider, is that he is fully endorsed by the Genmu Corporation." several murmurs spread through the crowd at that before Chroma continued. "Several years ago, when the Bugster first appeared, our company decided to try and find a way to defeat these creatures, thus coming up with Project: Kamen Rider, which as you definitely know by now, has born fruit and granted the world a hero capable of defeating the Bugster menace, allowing the Hunters to continue to focus on the Grimm. We are also the reason Kamen Rider is always able to arrive on the scene in time, using our state of the art technology to get him across the kingdoms where he is needed." he paused, letting the information settle for a few moments before continuing to speak. "This isn't the end of the Kamen Rider Project however, as our company has decided to create four new riders to help assist the first. As well, due to more riders coming into play, the first rider has asked me to pass along a message, that he will now be calling himself Kamen Rider Genmu, after the corporation that gave him his abilities."

Several of the reporters started asking questions at the same time, with Chroma waiting a few moments before silencing everyone and picking someone out of the crowd, letting the man speak "Why are these new riders only appearing now? And when can the world expect to see them?"

Chroma nodded "For starters, materials to construct the equipment needed have been scarce lately, and Genmu was always the only rider needed, but, it has come to my attention that he has been running himself ragged recently, so I intend to give him some assistance, as well, we needed viable candidates to take up the armors, not simply everyone can be a rider, they require the correct skills. As for when they will be shown to the world, I don't have a specific date set yet, but you should all expect to see them soon."

Focusing back on the two sisters, Yang slowly looked at Ruby, already knowing what to expect, proven right as Ruby's eyes were practically shining and she was vibrating in place.

It was basically like this when the Kamen Rider first showed up all those years ago, except back then, Ruby started bouncing around everywhere, hyped up because a real live super hero was walking the streets now.

After the news report was over, Yang mentally counted down from 3 until Ruby started doing her usual super fast speech about how it was so cool that there were going to be even more super heroes, before their attention was brought back to the screen as it showed a message reading 'Brought to you by Genmu Corporation.'

The screen then changed to show a girl with bright pink hair and eyes dressed like an Idol, wearing a frilly yellow, white and green dress with a small green hat on top of her head.

She was the mascot of the Genmu Corporation, Poppy Pipopapo, as well as the main character of their game Doremifa Beat.

She then started to sing an upbeat song, the theme of the corporation if the girl was right, it was called People Game.

Ruby was even humming along to the beat of the song.

Genmu Corporation was a huge company, one that specialized in a lot of different things, from home appliances, to movies, and their main selling point, video games (and apparently superheroes too now).

They were the biggest video game producer on Remnant, and they didn't just deal in software, they even made hardware, that is to say, consoles.

The first of them was called the Famicom, and it had revolutionized the world of many children.

Other consoles usually carried the Genmu name in the console's name, like G64, or Genmu 64.

As for just how the company came about, it sprung up suddenly roughly 25 years ago, and it became an instant hit, it was also interesting how much they made their own tech advance when it came to video games, starting at 2D 8 bit games, and now existing in a world where games were fully in 3D and Virtual Reality was just a few years off from being perfect.

Both Ruby and Yang were big fans of the company and tended to buy all the games that interested them, though thankfully Genmu kept their prices reasonable, usually a console was between 300 and 400 Lien while a game usually costed between 50 and 60 Lien for home console and between 30 and 40 Lien for portable console.

As for Ruby and Yang's favorite game, it would have to be Doremifa Beat, a rhythm game that followed the story of the aspiring idol, Poppy Pipopapo until she finally makes it to the big stage.

They could relate to the character a bit, since she was portrayed as a girl who wanted to realise her dreams, something they too wanted to do.

On the other side of the ship, stood Retsu, his hair on the teal side, who was looking at the screen with a raised eyebrow as he thought to himself 'He even has Poppy with him? I don't know if I should be impressed or worried, for all I know Parad could pop up.'

True, Chroma had been highly generous, but Retsu wasn't just going to trust him like that, he felt like he was hiding some things.

Suddenly, he saw someone pass in front of him, and they didn't look too good. It was a blonde boy with blue eyes who looked like a normal teenager, except he had some armor over his clothes and a sword at his hip. The reason he didn't look too good is because he was a bit green in the face and seemed to be holding back his lunch.

Retsu got his attention "Need a hand?" he asked the blonde teen, receiving a nod, with Retsu reaching over the railing and opening one of the many window squares before he turned back to the teen "I have no idea if we're allowed to do this." he said as he helped the blonde lean beyond the railing and let his out the window, where he promptly lost his lunch.

Meanwhile, directly underneath the ship, walking in the middle of the city of Vale was a grey haired teen wearing mostly blue, black and grey, and next to him, looking bored was a dark skinned girl with red eyes and mint green hair, wearing some beige and green colored clothes.

She looked up, about to pray to Oum that something interesting happened, before she spotted something falling down towards them, deciding to wisely step away from her partner, making him turn to look at her in confusion, to which she simply pointed up, making him look up with a raised eyebrow just in time to have something disgusting fall on his face.

Back up on the airship, Retsu and the blonde winced as they heard someone scream out in agony from outside the airship, with Retsu closing the window and looking away while the blonde boy laughed awkwardly.

"Pray you never meet whoever you just hit." Retsu said, with the blonde nodding in agreement. He cleared his throat before holding out his hand to Retsu "Name's Jaune Arc, good to meet you, and thanks for the help."

Retsu smiled a bit and shook Jaune's hand "Nice to meet you Jaune, name's Retsu Plaiy, though you might know me as Super Gamer R."

Jaune looked at him with wide eyes "That's you?! Dude, you showed up on Dustube out of the blue and you ALREADY have a golden play button award. And your playthrough of Breath of the Wild was really helpful by the way, I'm not done with it yet but I'm getting there with the pointers you gave out in it."

Retsu chuckled at that. "Glad I could help you in that case."

"I gotta ask though, why are you going to Beacon?" Jaune asked him, a bit confused that a famous gamer was going to a school for trained warriors.

Retsu shrugged a bit "Part of it is me fulfilling my side of a deal, the other is seeing how much of a challenge it could be." he explained, though he left the part that the deal was sort of forced onto him.

Jaune rose an eyebrow "Challenge?"

Retsu let a small grin slip in as he tilted his head ever so slightly, his hair now shifting over to more orange. "How hard is it to become a Huntsman, it seems like a fun idea for a little game."

Jaune wasn't sure how to react to that, so he simply shrugged.

* * *

"I must admit, I never expected this Chroma." the headmaster of Beacon, Ozpin, spoke to Chroma as the two were in contact through their scrolls.

"You know me Ozpin, I like to keep secrets, after all, you have some as well." Chroma said, his eyes glinting a bit, with Ozpin letting a small smirk pass as he nodded.

"Indeed, but, I have to ask, about the four riders you mentioned in the press conference, I can't help but notice you recommended FOUR new students to me… should I be informed of something here?" Ozpin asked with a raised eyebrow.

Chroma chuckled. "Maybe, but I suppose you'll see soon enough."

Ozpin shook his head with a sigh, muttering something about "So this is how it feels." before nodding at Chroma "Very well, I do hope we can speak again once the world learns a bit more."

"As long as you keep Ironwood out of my hair, I honestly don't mind telling you more." Chroma said, snorting a bit at the thought of the general.

With that, the call ended, and Chroma went back to work.

* * *

Minutes later, they felt the airship dock, with everyone walking out and looking up at the impressive sight that was Beacon academy.

Retsu, his hair back to mostly teal, stood next to Jaune as the two boys looked up in awe, before Retsu looked back at Jaune "I'll see you later man, I gotta go find some people."

Jaune looked back at him and nodded. "Alright, see ya later." he said as the two toned haired boy walked off, waving over his shoulder, before pulling out a GBA from his pocket and starting up a game of Super Mario Advance.

He kept on walking, seemingly aimlessly, before he heard someone speak to him. "Why am I not surprised the Super Gamer always brings a game with him wherever he goes?"

Retsu looked up, seeing Ai standing there, leaning against his new motorcycle, and his jacket and bike had some new additions on them, the word LAZER printed on it. Retsu put on a cocky smirk. "I could almost say the same thing about you, bringing that bike everywhere like it's your wife... something you want to tell me Ai-chan?~" he said, his grin getting wider as his voice took a teasing tone at the end.

Ai simply smirked at him. "Cheeky bastard aren't you?" he muttered before leaning away from his bike and pushing it along while walking next to Retsu.

Meanwhile, back with Ruby, she fell down on the ground after her sister ditched her to hang out with friends, mentally shouting out 'Traitor!' in her mind as she accidentally knocked over someone's luggage, which was accompanied with a shout of "What are you doing?!"

At the same time, a certain young surgeon was nearing the scene, and rose an eyebrow as a small container of dust rolled up at his feet, picking it up and turning it over to see the Schnee emblem, looking back up and seeing a white haired girl with icy blue eyes dressed completely in white with the same emblem on her back, shaking a vial of dust at Ruby.

He saw the cloud of dust particles gathering, his eyes widening a bit as he noticed the twitches in Ruby's face, knowing what would happen 'Oh dear.' he thought before rushing over and pinching her nose just before she sneezed, surprising both girls, and then both of them staring confused as he had a small mask that one would wear when performing an operation on his face.

He looked between the two girls, then at the cloud of dust, with the white haired one finally noticing it as well and looking down at her bottle of dust, her eyes widening in alarm as she noticed the cap being unscrewed a bit before closing it back up.

"Catastrophe averted I suppose." Edler said as he waved his hands downwards in the cloud of dust, pushing it down as Ruby pinched her nose on her own this time to be on the safe side.

"Thanks for that." she said now that they weren't in danger of blowing up anymore.

The white themed girl looked away in a bit of embarrassment, realising that this was partially her fault. "I should probably make sure my luggage is better secured from now on." she muttered, mostly herself, but the other two heard her. Idly though, the girl wondered why Edler was dressed like a doctor, honestly all he was missing was a stethoscope.

"That would be a wise idea miss." Edler said with a nod as he lowered the face mask, not really noticing as the girl stared at his face with a light dusting of pink on her cheeks since he was more focused on making sure no more dust was in the area.

"Um, sorry about knocking over your stuff, my sister kinda ditched me, see, she zipped past me, but she was kinda holding my shoulders, so I started to spin when she let go, and I got dizzy, and then I fell, and I knocked over you stuff and I'm really really sorry about that." Ruby said... all in one breath at that, rather impressive honestly.

The other girl stared at her for a few moments, before sighing. "Well, I suppose I can't blame you then if it's your sister's fault. You're forgiven."

Ruby smiled widely at that and held out her hand. "I'm Ruby Rose!" she presented herself with a bit of excitement, hoping to make a friend.

The girl seemed to weigh her options, before grabbing Ruby's hand and shaking it. "Weiss Schnee." the two girls then stopped shaking hands and both looked at the only boy present, a silent question obvious.

Edler looked at the two of them and smiled slightly "My name is Edler Ritter, pleasure to meet the two of you."

Weiss nodded and Ruby smiled, feeling proud of herself for making friends, before Weiss looked at her luggage. "If you'll excuse me, I need to get my luggage stored away safely, good day, Ruby, Edler." she said, her eyes lingering on Edler's face a bit before she started to walk towards Beacon.

Ruby waved as she left, before turning to Edler "Soooo...?" she trailed off, a bit unsure.

Edler smiled slightly at her, realising she didn't know what to say, he was about answer her before he spotted someone out of the corner of his eyes. "I need to go catch up with someone Ruby, but I wouldn't mind talking again later." he then noticed a certain blonde knight walking close. "I do see someone who seems to be in need of a friend though." Edler said, with Ruby following his eyes to see Jaune, and nodding at Edler's implied idea, before turning to him "Alright, see you later then Edler." she said with a smile as she ran up to Jaune to become his friend.

At the same time, Edler turned and walked towards the person he had noticed, walking up to Natt who was wearing an urban camo cloak at the moment, Edler noticing this "Do you have a cloak for every situation?"

"Yes, it pays to be cautious on a hunt." Natt answered simply.

Edler sighed slightly "So, what were you doing?"

Natt simply pointed to another area of the walkway, Edler looking there to see a black haired girl with amber eyes who had a bow in her hair, wearing clothes in shades of black, violet, and a bit of white, walking along while reading a book.

Edler turned back to look at Natt, an eyebrow raised in question. "Her bow twitches occasionally, I think she may be a Faunus and hiding herself." the sniper said plainly once more.

Edler nodded as he filed that information away. "Perhaps she's ashamed of it? Or maybe she wants to avoid being bullied?"

"Who knows? But let's not spoil the surprise, whatever her reason she wants it to be secret, that doesn't really matter to me, but I'll keep quiet." Natt said with a shrug.

Edler nodded in agreement, besides, it wasn't like she was hurting anyone with her secret, though he did think she was lying to herself by doing so.

* * *

Several minutes later, Retsu and Ai were standing next to each other in the auditorium, and Ai had been glad to find that Beacon had a parking garage for vehicles.

He did wonder who the owner of the yellowish orange bike was though, that thing was a beauty, a rocket made for speed, and he wondered if he couldn't race whoever their owner was.

From the small name tag attached to the back of the helmet, he at least knew they were called Yang.

Before the headmaster of the school arrived on the stage, Retsu was pleasantly surprised when he noticed Jaune and waved him over, the blonde walking up to them and introducing himself to Ai.

As Jaune was telling them about a girl he befriended called Ruby, Retsu noticed the headmaster walking onto the stage, shushing his two friends and turning their attention there to listen to the man's speech.

Retsu honestly expected something about hope, dreams, the typical uplifting speech for wannabe heroes. He was sorely disappointed when Ozpin killed the obviously growing mood.

A little ways away, Edler and Natt felt the same thing, and Natt could swear he saw Ozpin's face resist the urge to smirk in amusement 'He thinks it's funny.' he realised with a twitching eyebrow.

He was a sniper, he was damn well expected to have 20/20 eyesight.

* * *

"Well, first day was definitely interesting." Retsu said as he fell down on his sleeping bag with a 3DS in hand, playing the Megaman Zero Collection, while currently wearing a black t-shirt with a pink star in the middle and green sweat pants.

"Is that how you pronounce weird in Japan?" Ai muttered into his pillow from next to him, wearing a simple white sleeveless shirt and red shorts.

Retsu simply kicked him lightly in response.

Ai grunted before turning his head to look at the gamer. "So, any idea why we weren't allowed to go put our stuff in our locker ourselves?"

Retsu shrugged as he paused his game "No clue, maybe they actually haven't assigned our lockers yet?"

Ai paused in thought at that "Could be... guess we'll find out tomorrow."

Retsu nodded, before saving his game and turning it off "G'night." he said as he slipped into his sleeping bag and quickly drifted off to sleep.

Ai mumbled out his own goodnight before falling asleep as well, snoring directly into his pillow.

Not too far away from them, Edler and Natt were also getting ready for bed, and at the moment, Natt pitied Edler.

This was for the simple reason that a LOT of female students were staring at him in open lust.

Edler twitched a few times as he felt several stares on him, while all he wore was a grey short sleeved shirt and black sweatpants.

He had more reason to be annoyed since all Natt wore was a pair of navy blue pajama bottoms with neon green lines criss-crossing on it, and he was getting zero attention.

"You're taking first watch." Edler ground through his teeth, his german accent slipping through.

Natt rose an eyebrow before shrugging "Sure, I got a book in the meantime." he added while pulling out a war novel from his small packsack.

Edler nodded and lied down on his blanket and fell asleep soon enough... although if you glanced at him he didn't seem to be breathing, yet he was, something Natt confirmed when he placed his fingers near his nose since the lack of visible and audible breathing worried him.

Oddly enough this was a trait shared with a certain heiress who slept soundlessly, unnerving some of the people around her, including Ruby... until the young reaper shook her slightly, waking Weiss up, and confirming to Ruby she was in fact still breathing, reassuring the crimson tipped girl before falling back asleep immediately.

Back with Natt, he simply continued to read until he was certain every girl who had been openly staring at Edler was asleep, joining most of the people in the realm of dreams.

It was time to see what tomorrow would bring.

* * *

Meanwhile, overlooking the city of Vale from atop a building near the docks were Graphite and Tox.

Graphite stood with the Bugvisor MOD on his arm, and smirked as he swiped his arm across the city, an orange mist spraying out of the weapon's nozzles.

He chuckled silently, with Tox looking over the city impassively.

Graphite soon extended his arms outwards. "Rejoice my brethren, for your birth will soon come, and this pathetic cesspool of a world will fall to the might of the Bugsters."

Tox smirked in agreement as he pulled out the Knock-Out Fighter from his clothes. "And this little toy will help make things faster when we finally find the perfect person for it."

Graphite chuckled as he looked back at Tox. "Therein lies the beauty of it my friend." a grin split the green haired Bugster's face. "I have found the perfect candidate."

Tox simply laughed, before looking to the skies and muttering, "Game Start."

* * *

 **And that's it people!**

 **I hope you liked this new chapter to Gamer Hunters, and next time, it's time for the Emerald Forest.**

 **Sorry to disappoint with the lack of Henshins in this chapter.**

 **But I do hope you appreciate my section with Graphite and Tox, that was a last minute entry that I thought would be a nice addition.**

 **Anyway, see you all next time.**


	7. Level 2

**Huh, even I didn't expect to get another chapter out so soon.**

 **Anyway, it's finally time for what you've all been waiting for everyone.**

 **So let's not hold back.**

 **GAME START!**

* * *

Ai groaned as he got up the following morning, looking around tiredly to see a few more people either in the same process or already awake… or in some other cases, still very much asleep.

He held back a laugh as he saw a black haired girl with red tips and a white haired girl slapping a blonde girl repeatedly to try and wake her up.

He then turned his head to see Retsu, sleeping peacefully while snoring lightly.

He grabbed hold of the gamer and shook him a bit "Come on man, wake up."

To his surprise, he got no reaction, before shrugging and just shaking him again, just rougher.

Again, no reaction.

He decided to start patting the boy's cheek, slowly slapping a bit harder, only for his eyebrow to twitch when all that lead to was his hand stinging and his somewhat friend's face to have a red cheek for a few moments.

He then took a few breaths to calm himself, and leaned close to his ear "Hey! Wake up already!"

Say it with me now, nothing.

He was at his wit's end when he started to hear something, looking around for the source of the sound, until he looked to Retsu's pocket, raising and eyebrow and pulling something out of it, finding his video game… which was constantly blaring out the 1-up jingle from the 1st Sonic The Hedgehog game… like an alarm clock.

A millisecond later, he fell back in shock as Retsu bolted up and snatched his console out of the air when Ai lost his grip on it.

His whole face twitched as he noticed the boy, who had a bad case of bed hair since the orange colored half was pressing all the way down on the teal half, before he started to groan in no small amount of rage into his pillow while lying back down.

Retsu blinked tiredly as he looked around "Who the heck's snoring?" he mumbled to himself, before stopping and shaking his head with a sigh, then looking down at Ai "Get up Ai, we have a big day ahead of us."

Ai slowly removed his pillow from his face, shooting Retsu a look of murder.

It was too bad Retsu was already long gone to take a shower.

* * *

Ai stared blankly at the carrot haired girl as she kept on talking and talking and talking and talking to the oriental dressed boy with a magenta stripe in his black hair.

"What is her full lung capacity?" he muttered in disbelief as he absentmindedly opened his locker, turning to look inside of it, and blinking in surprise at what he found.

His weapons were present yes, but so was a certain something.

A Gamer Driver, along with a yellow gashat that had a motorcross racer on a dirt track, the title of the game being BAKUSOU BIKE.

At the same time, the others found the same things in their lockers, just with different gashats.

Retsu, his hair back on Teal, found a magenta colored MIGHTY ACTION X.

Edler, found a bit more, as while he had the light blue TADDLE QUEST gashat, he also found what appeared to be a modified stethoscope, which he hung around his neck since he figured that he would need it if it was outright given to him.

And finally, Natt found the navy blue colored BANG BANG SHOOTING.

Ai just kept on looking at both items, before slowly slipping the belt into his jacket, and blinking when it basically disappeared, before trying to bring it out a few times, still being confused each time it when in and out.

"How the heck did these get here though?" he mumbled after he finally snapped out of it, eyeing the gashat in confusion, before stopping "Right, nevermind, stupid question."

"About time our gear was finished." Natt muttered with a small grin on the other side of the room as he hid the gashat and belt.

"A bit odd that we're getting it NOW of all times though, it's almost like he's expecting something to go wrong." Edler said with a bit of confusion.

* * *

Meanwhile, in Chroma's office.

Spring was sitting in front of her father, the two having early lunch in his office, as she read a book at the same time "I bet 50 lien they get attacked by a pack of raging beowolves." she said suddenly.

Chroma simply continued to drink from a cup of coffee, before bringing it away from his lips "And I say those beowolves will be unknowing Bugster hosts."

And with that, the two shook on it.

* * *

Back to the story

Retsu suddenly blinked as he looked up at the ceiling with narrowed eyes "I feel like someone made a hilarious joke right now that gets better later on."

He then heard some familiar mumbling and turned to see Jaune looking around while muttering to himself "Looking for something Jaune?"

Jaune jumped a bit before looking at him "Oh! Hey Retsu. I'm just looking for my locker, think you can help? It's number 636."

Retsu pointed to his right using his thumb "Considering mine is 628, keep going over there, my guess is it's right next to that redhead chick."

Jaune followed his thumb to see said 'Redhead chick'.

She looked ready for battle, dressed like a gladiator, with her long scarlet red hair tied in a ponytail and sporting emerald green eyes.

If he was honest, she looked somewhat pretty.

As Jaune left to go grab his stuff and talk with the girl, Retsu pulled MIGHTY ACTION X out of his pocket for a moment, grinning at it slightly before storing it away again.

He was about to leave, when his eyes noticed a rather cute girl… Ruby.

He looked at her for a few moments, before smiling slightly as he went and left the locker room to go to the cliffs, which he heard from the speakers just as he was leaving the room. Along the way though, he met up with his fellow Riders in an out of the way corner, Natt and Edler seemingly discussing something, with Ai having just joined in.

"What are you guys talking about?" Retsu inquired curiously.

"Mostly going over everything we've seen so far and exchanging what we did for the last year." Edler answered him.

"I do want to hear that to be honest." Retsu admitted with a slight smile.

"Well, I was mostly going around Atlas, helping out wherever I could, though mostly I helped the homeless and sick." Edler answered simply.

"I was hunting bounties in Mistral, no big human targets though, but I did bag and tag a lot of Grimm… one of them almost got me though, some weird thing attached to a horse's back. I managed to make it lose a horn though and sold it for a good price." Natt said, remembering his fight with the strange Grimm.

"I took on races, mostly in outer Vale and in Vacuo, you gotta love the desert races, seriously, they can be pretty surprising." Ai said with a small laugh.

"Well, as for me, I kinda ended up just sticking in Vale, and funny enough, I found that I had an account and funds donated to me from Genmu Corp. So, I decided to take those funds and got an apartment, and bought games and systems while starting up a channel on Remnant's version of Youtube. Oh, and I went and found a few martial arts classes that also taught you how to use some basic kinds of weapons." Retsu explained with a grin.

The others all stared at him for a few moments, not really sure what to say to the fact he mostly played video games for the last year.

They continued on like this, exchanging a few words about what they've seen, until they reached the cliff, and ended up arriving after a few other people since they took their time to get there.

Within the following hour, many more potential students had arrived and took their places on the grey plates on the ground, though Retsu was crouched down and poking his curiously a few times before getting back up.

Once the headmaster confirmed everyone was present, he finally decided to explain the initiation.

To spare you the long version, here's the short one: The first person you cross eyes with is your partner for the next four years, get to the ruins on the other side of the forest and grab a relic, and kill every monster that gets in the way.

Shortly after the explanation was done, the students started getting flung… with Retsu being the first, and slightly surprised at it too.

He spun around a bit in the air before righting himself "A little bit of warning would have been nice." he grunted in slight annoyance.

Still, he had to admit, the view as he flew through the air was nice.

Soon, he started to descend, nearing the trees, and his face split into a grin as his whole body shined brightly, before being seemingly covered in metal, as he entered the trees and broke through every single one in his path.

He kept on plowing through, eventually sliding through the ground until he slowly stopped and he stood up, his body flashing as it turned back to normal.

"Power ups are awesome… even better when their your semblance." he chuckled to himself as he started to walk.

Meanwhile, the others were still sailing through the air, but soon coming down as well.

Ai took out his weapons and shifted them into sickle mode, before stabbing them into a tree and spinning around it once before launching into another tree, slowly losing his momentum with each spin, until he slowly slid down to the ground and walked.

Edler pondered what to do, before he brought out his sword and activated the ice dust in it and and pressed a button on the pommel of the blade, making it shoot out a wave of ice forward and at a downward angle, which he set his feet on and started to slide down until he landed on the ground.

Natt simply brought out his magnum before changing it into it's sniper form and using the recoil from each shot fired to slow himself down, but at the same time, he shot at the base of an oncoming tree, the bullets packing enough punch to tear away at it, until it fell down in Natt's direction, with the sniper's feet landing on it's back and sliding down while it kept falling, before rolling out of his momentum when he reached the ground.

Back with Retsu, he looked around while slowly walking forwards, enjoying the scenery a bit before he would most likely run into trouble.

It was a given after all when you were somewhere you didn't fully know.

Suddenly he stopped, idly realising something.

This was a perfect chance to test out a certain function of the Gamer Driver.

He reached into his vest, pulling it out before putting it on his waist, not at all being surprised when the belt formed along with the Kimewaza Slot Holder on the side, which he quickly pushed down on it's button.

" **STAGE SELECT!"**

He blinked slightly when the holographic screens appeared around him, rotating on their own, before he moved his hand, making it stop rotating and made it move himself.

He grinned a bit "Perfect, now, where to go for this?" he mused quietly to himself before shrugging and making the wheel spin wildly for several seconds, until he stopped it and chose a level at the same time.

The area around him digitized and pixelated, before turning into a...cove of sorts...hidden in a forest, a river flowing through the area as he stood on on the rocky beach like area.

He looked around in a bit of awe.

It was one thing to see it in a show, but to actually experience the world essentially warping around you like a video game was something else entirely.

"The hell?" he heard a voice say from nearby, along with a pixelizing sound, making him turn his head to see Ai suddenly appear in the Game Area… right in the middle of the river.

Retsu stared at the motorcross racer for a few seconds as he tried to walk out of the rapidly flowing stream, almost falling over a few times, before he started to laugh rather loudly.

Ai looked up at him with an annoyed glare as he shook his legs to try and dry them "It ain't that funny." he muttered in a slightly embarrassed tone.

It didn't help that Retsu was far from done.

Meanwhile, in another modified area of the forest, Edler stood overlooking a stone quarry with several broken down construction vehicles strewn about.

"Interesting, I didn't expect something like this just from the belt." he muttered in curious surprise.

He was even more surprised when he saw the area pixelize down in the quarry as Natt appeared suddenly, looking around the area.

Edler blinked in surprise, before bringing his fingers to his lips and whistling loudly, catching the sniper's attention as he looked towards the young doctor, nodding as the two locked eyes and Edler started to walk down into the quarry below.

"I didn't expect for the belt's function to prove this helpful." Edler said as he neared Natt.

The sniper nodded at his words "Yeah, it's definitely unexpected… wonder where we'll be when we turn it off?" he voiced curiously.

"Only one way to find out." Edler said, with Natt nodding as both of them pressed the silver button once more, turning off the area, reappearing in the Emerald Forest.

"This is where I was when I hit the button." Natt said, with Edler nodding as the two removed the belts and stored them away again.

Sometime later, the pair arrived at what they figured were the ruins that Ozpin had mentioned.

Natt rose an eyebrow as he picked up a white bishop piece from a pedestal "Chess pieces?" he muttered in confusion.

"Interesting choice for a relic." Edler commented.

They heard the foliage behind them rustle lightly, turning around while slowly reaching for their weapons… before relaxing as they saw Retsu and Ai stepping out of the treeline.

"Huh, this is a surprise." Ai said as they saw the other two who had been brought in from Earth.

"Bout time we saw you two again." Retsu said with a lazy grin as he crossed his arms behind his head.

"It hasn't been that long though." Edler commented amusedly.

"You know what I meant." Retsu waved off the comment with a small laugh.

"Well, didn't think those so called relics would be so simple." Ai said as he went and grabbed the other white bishop piece.

"Well, I'll be honest, I'm surprised we didn't run into any resistance on the way, but we'd better not risk it and head back for the school now." Natt said, crossing his arms.

"Ai and I ran into a bit of resistance, just a few Beowolves, nothing we couldn't handle." Retsu answered with a shrug.

Natt nodded before the 4 boys made their way back towards the school.

After a while though, they started to hear a bit more activity in the forest, and soon a rather loud commotion back at the temple.

They all glanced at each other "Should we?" Ai said, somewhat unsure.

Natt nodded "It would be best, for all we know it could be other students in danger."

The other three nodded at that as they all quickly made their way back to the ruins, arriving just in time to see a Nevermore flying overhead in the distance.

"Guess the action moved a bit." Retsu said as they followed to where the large bird was flying and seemingly fighting against students.

They arrived just in time to see a large Deathstalker killed, with 4 teens, one of which included Jaune, landing in front of a collapsing stone bridge while the large scorpion's corpse fell into the ravine below.

Retsu stepped up to the small group "Looks like you just destroyed that thing." he said while holding his hand out to Jaune.

The blonde boy looked up, blinking in surprise at seeing his friend, before grabbing his hand and hoisting himself up "Yeah, Pyrrha and Nora did most of the work though."

"Who and who?" Retsu asked, so confused you could just picture the question mark above his head.

Jaune blinked before he realised the confusion was justified and pointed to the two girls next to him.

"Pyrrha Nikos huh? I've seen some of her fights, she's rather good." Natt said thoughtfully as he looked at the gladiator-like girl.

The two groups stepped closer to one another, before looking at the ruins in the ravine, seeing a group led by Ruby… and how they were essentially destroying a Nevermore.

"I like her style." Ai said with a smirk as he watched Yang shooting down the Nevermore's throat while holding the beak open herself.

"It seems I'm not the only dust user here." Edler said as he saw Weiss make liberal use of ice dust to trap the giant bird.

"Nice use of her ribbon." Natt muttered with a nod of approval as he saw the girls use the secret faunus's ribbon on her weapon to make something akin to giant slingshot.

"Awesome." Retsu breathed in awe as he saw Ruby run up the cliff while dragging the Nevermore with her and then decapitating it.

They watched for a few more moments, before turning around as they heard something coming their way.

"Looks like we're getting a bit more action." Ai said as he grabbed his sickles in preparation.

He wasn't disappointed when a pack of Beowolves appeared, running at them.

"This should be interesting." Natt said as he readied his magnum.

"Come and get some!" Retsu said as he grabbed his weapon, generating a teal colored mallet from the hole in it.

They were ready for their own chance to show off… and it seems they missed it because the Beowolves collapsed suddenly.

Everyone present, including the girls over the ravine, just stared at the Grimm blankly.

"Well… that was anti-climatic." Edler said slowly, unsure how to proceed.

Retsu slowly looked at everyone present "Did someone use Haki or something?" he muttered to himself, slightly confused.

And then the bodies of the beowolves started to be covered in orange pixels.

"Guess we're not out of the woods yet." Natt muttered as he slowly put his weapon way and reached for his driver and gashat.

* * *

Meanwhile, Genmu Corp.

"Well, I didn't think I'd be right." Chroma said as he looked at the live feed from the Emerald Forest… while Spring was sulking in the background at having lost the bet.

"This is certainly most concerning." Ozpin said from a small square off to the side of Chroma's computer screen.

"Indeed… but I think I can use this, would you mind letting me edit it a bit and broadcast the live feed?" Chroma asked the headmaster with a raised eyebrow.

"I suppose it does have it's use, very well, this one's all yours old friend." Ozpin said with a nod.

Chroma smirked a bit as he cracked his fingers and started typing away to edit the video.

* * *

The bodies of the beowolves continued to shift into pixels, with the four riders bringing out their drivers and their gashats.

"Well, this is just as much a chance to show off as the last one was." Retsu said as he and the others put the drivers around their waists.

Edler looked at the stethoscope for a moment as well "This is most likely used to detect Game Disease." he looked back at the slowly amassing mass of pixels "But I don't think I need to hammer the point further in for this case."

While the boys were getting ready to see just what their opponent would look like, everyone else has managed to regroup close to the collapsed bridge.

"That's definitely not good." Yang muttered as the pixels kept building up.

"So those Grimm were infected with the Bugster Virus, it's rare, but it has happened before." Weiss said as she observed the fallen beasts.

Meanwhile, Ruby was looking at the four boys curiously, having noticed their large blocky, neon green belts.

She could swear she'd seen that somewhere before.

"Hey, doesn't Kamen Rider use that kinda belt?" Ruby heard from next to her, turning her head to see Nora staring at the same thing she was.

"The news report said his name is Kamen Rider Genmu now Nora." Ren corrected his friend lightly.

Ruby wasn't listening to their conversation though, she had stopped moving as she remembered all the news reports about the Kamen Rider, and specifically, the pictures of him, and mentally focused on his belt.

It really was the same belt.

Her go to reaction of freaking out though was stopped when she saw the four boys pull out what looked like game cartridges, which instead confused her.

As she had that thought, the bugster finally finished forming, taking on the shape of what could best be described as a large golem.

"Game time." Retsu whispered as the four of them pressed the buttons on the gashats, generating the title screens of the games behind them and sending out four waves of pixels from the source, along with several different containers flying out of the screens, from brown blocks, to treasure chests, drum barrels, and trophies.

" **BANG BANG SHOOTING!"**

" **TADDLE QUEST!"**

" **BAKUSOU BIKE!"**

" **MIGHTY ACTION X!"**

They each held their gashat differently, Natt held his like a gun, Edler was holding his like a scalped, Ai was holding his like a bike's handle bar, and Retsu… well he was the only one who was consciously copying the original rider's pose.

"Henshin." the four of them said at the same time as they inserted their gashats into their belts, creating a character select wheel around each of them.

" **LET'S GAME! MECHA GAME! MUCHA GAME! WHAT'S YOUR NAME?! I'M A KAMEN RIDER!"**

Retsu and Edler both pressed their icons with the palm of their hands, though Edler did so when it was at his side, Ai kicked his own icon when it was in front of him, while Natt pointed his finger at his and pretended to fire a gun, as the armor pixelated onto them.

Although, to say that their fellow potential students were staring at them blankly would be an understatement.

They all shared the same basic body, wearing a black undersuit with white armor pieces on top of it, though the differences came in their helmets and gamepad looking chest pieces.

Natt's helmet actually looked similar to his normal appearance, except the navy blue on the top was from a military helmet with the letters STG printed onto it in neon green, a neon green piece of hair covering his right eye, with the actual eyes being red. On his chest plate were icons for a single bullet and a trio of bullets below his two gauges.

Edler's helmet gave off the appearance of a knight, complete with a helmet plume, which was a sky blue just like the back of the helmet, with the eyes of the helmet being yellow. On his chest were icons for a fire and a snowflake below his gauges, and in his left hand was a small blue shield.

Ai's helmet had a shape similar to a bike helmet, although it had a line of magenta spikes on top, similar to a mohawk, and coming out the back were two motorcycle handlebars, with the eyes in the helmet being blue. The icons on his chest showed a sickle and a bow, while in his hands were what appeared to be a pair of wheels with guns jutting out of both of them.

Finally, Retsu's helmet was shaped exactly like Genmu's helmet, just with three hair spikes instead of four, and the colors were different as well, with the hair being magenta in color and the eyes orange. On his chest plate were icons for a mallet and a sword.

… oh, and all four of them looked like mascots. Short, super deformed, chibi mascots.

All of them, save for Retsu who knew what to expect, looked down at themselves, before all muttering at the same time "What?" If it weren't for the helmets covering their faces, the sheer look of disbelief on their faces would have been priceless.

Retsu looked at them, realising they were confused, so he decided to explain "These are our Level 1 forms, used to separate a Bugster from a patient, or in other terms, and mostly in this case, destroy a Bugster Union." he said while pointing at said Union which was ignoring them and wandering the area, looking around slowly "These forms aren't the fastest, but they do have some abilities that are helpful in that task, for example, Snipe can create an energy shell around his body and launch himself like a bullet, and Lazer has his two wheel blasters." he explained while pointing at both mentioned riders, who nodded in understanding and inspected their bodies more thoroughly.

"What about you and me?" Edler stage whispered to Retsu.

"Standard bonuses shared between all four of us, enhanced strength... though, you have your shield, and I have my platforming skills." Retsu said, before an item wheel appeared around him and deposited a mallet in his hand.

" **GASHACON BREAKER!"** "Plus we each have a Gashacon weapon." he continued as he twirled the weapon in his hands.

"I see." Edler mused as he concentrated a bit and the item wheel surrounded him before depositing a sword with an orange blade in his hands " **GASHACON SWORD!"**

"I feel like my weapon is obvious." Natt said as he looked at the two of them before his own item wheel appeared around him to give him his weapon " **GASHACON MAGNUM!"**

"Guess it was." Ai chuckled "As for me, well I don't think I need my weapon just yet, what with these things." he said while shaking his wheels a bit.

"So, other thing I should explain as well, you see those containers our gashats generated?" Retsu said while gesturing to the many blocks, chests, cylinders and trophies around the area.

"I'm guessing they have something helpful to them?" Natt mused out loud.

Retsu nodded "That's right, they contain energy items, basically power-ups, and sometimes they can even create some with negative effects."

"Than they can certainly come in handy should we need them." Edler said as he looked at the area.

"Right, now, let's handle this guys, first, Ai-" Natt started before being cut off.

"Hey, hold on a bit, use our rider names when we're transformed, they exist for a reason." Ex-Aid cut off with a wave of his hand in front of Snipe's face.

Snipe mulled it over for a few seconds before nodding "Fair enough, alright then, Lazer, you and I are going to get that thing's attention, Ex-Aid, you're the platformer, so you get on high for overhead attacks, Brave, stick close to the ground and attack its legs."

 **(Insert: "Excite" by Daichi Miura)**

"Simple enough." Ex-Aid said calmly before suddenly jumping up high and then jumping again towards one of the many floating blocks while Brave ran in with his sword at the ready.

"You gonna try that bullet thing?" Lazer wondered as he aimed his weapons at the bugster.

"Yeah, it's definitely a nice sounding skill." Snipe said as he concentrated a bit, before jumping and spinning like a top as he was surrounded in a bullet shell and shot forward at the large monster, the shell exploding it and making it stagger as Lazer opened fire on it's back to make it turn around as Brave got closer to it's legs, while Snipe landed back down and staggered a bit as he lost two pieces on his AP gauge, shaking his head to clear himself from the dizziness "Note to self, don't do that often." he said before raising is magnum and shooting at the bugster, which finally turned around to them and tried to lumber forward, only to stumble as Brave got between it's legs and slashed at its ankles, though he clicked his teeth in anger when he saw that the damage regenerated.

"Suppose it was too much to hope to make it unable to walk." he said before he continued to attack its legs while Lazer and Snipe kept on shooting at it and dodging out of the way of it's arms… which were capable of extending forward.

Meanwhile, Ex-Aid was jumping from one block to the next, getting into position to attack, before noticing a block in his path "Let's see what we get." he muttered before using his mallet to break it open, revealing a floating disk inside.

The disk was red, and showed a featureless rider flexing his muscular arm.

"Item Get." Ex-Aid said as he grabbed the floating disk, which shined and flew into his body " **MUSCULAR!"** making his arms beef up briefly before returning to their normal appearance, followed by him jumping off the aerial blocks and falling down towards the bugster "Have some of this!" he shouted as he brought down his mallet on top of it's head, making it's whole body shake as the top of it's head caved in a bit before returning to normal, though it did stagger even more now and seemed close to falling down.

As the riders kept attacking the large Bugster Union and avoiding it's clumsy attacks, the others were watching, their blank faces being replaced for dropped jaws.

"Their all so tiny." Yang muttered, utterly confused, turning to her partner, the hidden faunus girl "You ever seen something like this before Blake?"

Blake shook her head, just as dumbfounded as her partner "No, and I've travelled a lot."

"How does using video games make them this strong? This doesn't make any sense!" Weiss griped as she tried to understand the concept in front of her.

Ruby was mostly speechless, but that was because she was silently freaking out about watching super heroes doing their work from up close.

Nora was also freaking out… but she was much more vocal about it, we'll save you the details though because the only person who can keep up with her is Ren and he's focused on the fight at the moment.

"Woah… now that, is what I call awesome." Jaune breathed in awe.

"They certainly work well as a team at least." Pyrrha said as she watched the riders work in tandem to leave the Bugster virtually helpless.

Back to the riders, the four of them could see that the Bugster seemed to be ready to collapse, meaning it was time to topple it over.

"Me first." Lazer said as he shot at a trophy, breaking it open and revealing a yellow medal that depicted a rider running quickly, which flew into him " **SPEED UP!"** his body glowed yellow for a few moments before he shot forward and rammed right into the Bugster's gut, before jumping off and firing from his wheel guns at the same time.

"Let's see what this does." Snipe muttered as he pressed the B button on his weapon and pulled the trigger, being slightly surprised when it fired in rapid bursts right in it's face.

"Interesting, let's see what mine does." Brave said as he watched Snipe, followed by pressing his own B button, pausing for a moment when it played a guitar riff and then fully lit up on fire "... this is good." he said with a nod, before jumping up and slashing the Bugster's back, leaving a burning cut behind.

"And for the finishing touch!" Ex-Aid said as he jumped up before falling down and stomping onto it's head, jumping back away in a backflip and landing perfectly while the Bugster fell on it's back.

"Nicely done." Snipe said as the four riders regrouped.

"It's not over yet though, when a Bugster Union is defeated, there's always high chances of it splitting off into small Bugsters, when that happens, it's time for Level 2 and beyond." Ex-Aid said as he motioned towards the large monster which was changing into pixels again, though the pieces appeared to be separating into smaller parts.

"Time to see just what these suits can do then." Lazer said as he threw away his wheel guns.

"Here it comes." Brave said as the Union finished separating, forming into a somewhat large group of grunt Bugsters, all of them rather featureless.

"Alright." Ex-Aid muttered as he threw his Gashacon Breaker up into the air and crossed his arms in front of himself "Dai Henshin!" and pulled the lever on the gamer driver.

" **GACHAN! LEVEL UP! MIGHTY JUMP! MIGHTY KICK! MIGHTY, MIGHTY ACTION X!"**

With the belt opened up, the holographic screen flew out in a magenta color before passing over Ex-Aid, who jumped up and performed a few acrobatic moves in the air, followed by the white armor breaking off his body and finally landing down on the ground.

Now that he was Level 2, his appearance was the same as Genmu, save for his color scheme, with the majority of his suit being magenta colored, with green highlights, and the lines on his body suit were black.

He held his hand out, with the Gashacon Breaker falling into it as he grasped it and than hit the A button " **JA KIN!"** causing a blade to pop out the top of the mallet.

"Skill level 2." Brave said as he pulled the lever on his Gamer Driver.

" **GACHAN! LEVEL UP! TADDLE MEGURU! TADDLE MEGURU! TADDLE QUEST!"**

When the holo screen passed over Brave, his body seemed to float up through a tunnel surrounded by several doors while the white armor disappeared, until he opened a set of double doors and floated through them as his feet touched the ground again, the doors disappearing in a flash of blue pixels.

Brave's amor still evoked a medieval knight feel, with sky blue shoulder pauldrons, a black undersuit, and sky blue lines on the undersuit that seemed to be shaped to look like armor pieces. His forearms were white, with his shield now being attached to his left forearm, his hands being sky blue, and his legs having metal knee guards and shin guards. Much like Ex-Aid and Genmu, his feet looked like a pair of sneakers. Finally, his previously large head was now flattened and attached to his back.

"Second tactic." Snipe uttered before pulling open his lever.

" **GACHAN! LEVEL UP! BA-BA-BANG! BANG-BA-BANG! (YOW!) BANG BANG SHOOTING!"**

Once the holo screen passed through him, Snipe jumped up and started shooting at a multitude of targets that appeared in the air before the white armor burst open and he fell back down.

His suit was mostly navy blue colored with neon green highlights, including what looked like tiger stripes on the side of his bodysuit. However the most noticeable detail would be the neon green cloak that covered his right side. Just like the others, his previous head was visible on his back.

"Second lap." Lazer said as he pulled open the lever to his Gamer Driver.

" **GACHAN! LEVEL UP! BAKUSOU! DOKUSOU! GEKISOU! BOUSOU! BAKUSOU BIKE!"**

When the holo screen passed over him, much to his surprise the wheels he threw away came back to him and his body jumped up before falling down on a road and using the wheels to cruise on it, before jumping off a cliff's edge and the wheels attaching themselves to his body…

… and said body fell down on the ground… now in the shape of a motorcycle.

The motorcycle was yellow in color with magenta colored highlights, and weirdly, if the placement of the eyes were to be trusted, his head was essentially the headlights.

Everyone, the Bugsters included, stopped moving and just slowly stared at him.

He seemed to notice this and swivelled the front wheel, which made his head turn "What? What is it?" he said, not seeing what was the problem.

Everyone just looked between each other… until one brave bugster walked up and morphed it's body slowly into a mirror to allow Lazer to see himself.

He stilled as he just stared at himself in the mirror for several moments.

Suddenly, he roared in anger and hopped onto the front wheel, spinning the rest of his body as flames came out of his exhaust pipes, shattering the lone Bugster at the same time.

Everyone stared at him as he continued to spin, before his wheels were eventually both on the ground. "I swear to god I'm gonna kick that Chroma guy's ass!" he shouted out before letting out a calming breath "I'm ok. I'm ok. I just really needed to vent because this is infuriating."

"It also makes no sense!" Weiss shouted at him.

"You think I didn't realise that snow white?" Lazer muttered in response.

Ex-Aid went up to Lazer and patted him on where he thought his shoulder would relatively be "Don't worry, you can still control your body, and I'm pretty sure it's possible for you to fight what with the stunt you just pulled."

Lazer sighed "Yeah, I guess, feels seriously weird though."

Ex-Aid nodded, before turning back to the Bugsters "Now then." he snapped his fingers and pointed his hand off to the side with the palm facing up "Let's clear this game with no continues!"

"Nice catchphrase." Snipe said as he opened fire on the Bugsters.

With that, the other riders rushed in as well, Blade and Ex-Aid cutting down every Bugster in their path, while Lazer ran them over and burned any that got behind with his exhaust flames.

Honestly, the battle was easy, so some of them it was perfect to test their equipment a little more.

"Let's see what this button does." Snipe said as he pressed the A button " **ZU KYUN!"** and turned the Gashacon Magnum into it's rifle mode, with him looking it over "Perfect." he said while taking a knee and sniping the bugsters from afar, pausing for a moment and pressing the B button, the targeting reticle lighting up and locking onto multiple targets, before he pulled the trigger and let loose several guided bullets, all of them finding their mark.

"I always thought the video game effects were going overboard...but now it makes a whole lot more sense…" Blake deadpanned from where the rest of them were watching.

Meanwhile, Brave was still cutting through the enemies, having plenty of targets to practice on "Let's see what this does." he said while pressing the A button, raising an eyebrow underneath his helmet when their wasn't a vocal sound effect, and the only thing he heard was the cracking of ice, the sword now generating a bit of frosty aura as the blade at turned an icy blue, he was about to slash, before pausing "I wonder…?" he muttered, before raising the blade high and bringing it down in a quick swing, cutting the Bugster in front of him… and the other two behind it, all with an obvious frozen cut on their bodies "I see, these armors can even enhance semblances."

"Coming through jerks!" Lazer shouted as he plowed through everything in his path, using both of his wheels to tear through them, slamming into them, and burning them with his exhaust flames.

Ex-Aid noticed how well he was doing, and suddenly jumped up high "Oi! Lazer, team up!"

"Huh?... Oh, I think I get what he means." Lazer said before chuckling as he suddenly spun on his front wheel to clear the area around him, with Ex-Aid landing on the bike's seat moments later.

"Please tell me this is your back right now." Ex-Aid muttered as he grabbed the handlebar and revved the engine.

Lazer laughed loudly as he understood what Ex-Aid meant with his question "Yeah, don't worry, you're sitting on my back right now." he said, prompting a sigh of relief from his fellow rider.

With the possible awkwardness lifted, the two got to work, and now that they were paired up, they were destroying the bugsters with far more efficiency than before.

"How come this is working so much better right now?" Lazer asked as they popped a wheelie and hit a Bugster right in the face with the front wheel.

"Because Bakusou Bike was designed to essentially have someone pilot the body while the one inside the bike activates his abilities, basically, it's because you're purely focused on attacks, while I'm maneuvering." Ex-Aid explained as he used his weapon to slash at a Bugster and hit another on the head with the mallet portion of his weapon.

"Hey! Finish time guys!" Snipe shouted over to the other riders, who ran back and looked at the remaining enemies to see that what remained seemed ready to keel over.

"Let's see what we can do." Brave said as him and Snipe took out their gashats and placed them in the Kimewaza slot.

"Hey, can someone do mine?" Lazer said, with Ex-Aid responding by pulling out Bakusou Bike and putting it into the Kimewaza slot "Thanks."

"No problem." Ex-Aid said as he pulled out his gashat, but before he put it into his Kimewaza slot, he blew on the part that went into a slot, before inserting it, with the riders pressing down on their silver buttons. (and Ex-Aid pressing Lazer's button for him.)

" **KIMEWAZA!"**

All of them felt the energy of the gashat flow through them, and picked where hey wanted it to settle, with Brave and Snipe placing it in their weapons, Ex-Aid in his foot, and Lazer in his whole body.

Meanwhile, back with the other students, they could practically feel the energy building up in the riders, all of them were hoping to never be on the receiving end of that kind of attack… as for Ruby, she practically had stars in her eyes at the fact she was getting to see a finisher from up close.

The first to act were Brave and Snipe who pressed their buttons again.

" **BANG BANG/TADDLE CRITICAL STRIKE!"**

With their eyes glowing and the energy reaching it's peak, the two let loose, Brave slashing forwards and sending a wave of charged ice energy and Snipe firing off a powerful bullet, the two attacks exploding on impact with the enemy.

The next to act was Lazer, who has his button pressed by Ex-Aid.

" **BAKUSOU CRITICAL STRIKE!"**

With the energy at it's peak, Lazer charged in with his body completely covered in it, essentially looking like a blazing comet at the moment as he mowed down everything in his path.

And when he was clear from the area, Ex-Aid finally activated his.

" **MIGHTY CRITICAL STRIKE!"**

When the energy peaked, Ex-Aid jumped up high and aimed his foot at the Bugster while tucking his other leg in, and he couldn't help himself from shouting out his next words.

"Rider Kick!" he said as he crashed into the group of Bugsters, dispersing the energy from his kick throughout what was left of them, and kicking off the one he hit, performing a backflip in the air and landing next to the other riders while raising his arm up with his fist closed.

" **KAISHIN NO IPPATSU!"**

"Mission complete." Snipe said as he shouldered his gun, the other riders relaxing as well, though what happened next made three of them raise their eyebrows and one of them chuckle a bit.

" **GAME CLEAR!"** that announcement was accompanied by a small victory jingle.

"He really went all out to make sure we know we're powered by games." Lazer said dryly as the four riders untransformed, with Lazer being able to close his lever with a simple thought and eject his gashat at the same time, which he caught in his hand as he landed face first on the ground. "Note to self, jump onto the back wheel before changing back." he mumbled into the ground before hoisting himself up.

"I just realised something." they all heard Retsu say, turning to look at him to see him looking behind them, making them follow his sight… and notice the 8 other students staring at them.

Natt groaned as he rubbed his forehead "Shit. Forgot we had witnesses."

At the same time, Edler mumbled something in german under his breath, and whatever it was, it was probably from annoyance or disappointment if him shaking his head was any clue.

"What should we do?" Ai asked, a bit ticked off himself.

"At this point?" Retsu asked, before shrugging "The only thing we can do is go with the flow."

* * *

Genmu Corp.

Chroma leaned back in his chair with a sigh as the broadcast was finally finished, with him watching every news channel replaying certain bits of the fight.

He'd made sure to edit out the faces of the riders, as well as any signs that could show the area was the Emerald Forest, which included the 8 other Beacon students present in the area.

He also didn't want to deal with hearing Jacques complain to him about his daughter being on the evening news.

Honestly, that man just annoyed him.

It was why he was secretly helping the man's wife find a way to divorce him, since Willow, the actual carrier of the Schnee name between those two, was very much tied down into a loveless marriage.

Also, he owed Willow a few favors, what with the fact she had helped him get Genmu Corp. off the ground.

Though… he did cringe a bit as he remembered that Willow had told him her son Whitely was a lost cause.

Basically, she was leaving Whitely with Jacques, and Weiss and Winter would still be Schnees, while those two men wouldn't anymore.

You win some you lose some he supposed.

Either way, for now, he was simply going to rest, and watch the team assignment ceremony from one of the cameras in the room

* * *

Retsu rose an eyebrow as the tall form of Cardin Winchester walked past him after being assigned leader of his team.

That boy had the air of a bully around him.

He was brought out of his thoughts as he heard the next set of names being called out.

"Jaune Arc, Pyrrha Nikos, Lie Ren, Nora Valkyrie. You four brought back the white rook, as such, you will now be known as team JNPR (Juniper), led by… Jaune Arc." Ozpin said to the new team, with Jaune going slack jawed at the fact he was leader, before suddenly being playfully shoved by Pyrrha… though because he was unprepared for it he fell down.

"Yeah! Go Jaune!" Retsu… and Ruby cheered at the same time, making them turn to each other and blink, before laughing a bit.

With that, the newly formed team JNPR stepped off the stage, to let the next people come up.

"Blake Belladonna, Ruby Rose, Weiss Schnee, Yang Xiao Long. You four brought back the white knight pieces, so, from today on, you shall be team RWBY (Ruby), led by… Ruby Rose." Ozpin said, shocking a lot of people.

Up on the stage, Ruby was just as slack jawed as Jaune was before Yang hugged her, and Blake clapped with a small polite smile.

As for Weiss, she was torn.

On one hand, she had wanted to be leader of her own team.

On the other hand, Ruby had shown to be good, and she was starting to become good friends with her.

She supposes she'll have to take her time and see things through for now.

With that, team RWBY stepped off the stage, with Retsu giving the girls two thumbs up, and Ruby returned them happily.

They had gotten along pretty well on the walk back to the school.

"Retsu Plaiy, Edler Ritter, Natt Jeger, Ai Sudu… or, as everyone knows now because of another student, Ex-Aid, Brave, Snipe, Lazer." Ozpin started, the image above them first showing their actual faces, before showing their rider icons, and the four boys turned their eyes to Nora, who was whistling innocently.

They had asked their fellow students to keep quiet about their Rider identities, but apparently Nora wasn't listening because as soon as she walked into the room, she shouted "Hey! Did you see these guys?! Their freaking super heroes! They took on a huge Bugster that appeared in the forest and then destroyed a big group of smaller ones!"

Natt's eyebrow had been twitching as she talked, the only clear sign of him being angry at being exposed already.

Back to the present though, Ozpin continued after reminding everyone of what happened in the last half hour "The four of you retrieved the white bishop pieces, as such, using your codenames, you will be known as team SBLE (Sable (french for sand)), led by… Natt Jeger."

Natt bowed a bit "Thank you for this opportunity headmaster." he said respectfully before he and his new team moved off the stage.

As everyone filed out, Ozpin cast a glance at the camera, smirking slightly before muttering "I feel this year is going to be the most interesting yet."

* * *

A young man was walking off a boat at the Vale docks.

He stood out a bit, what with wearing a purple shirt with a pixelised rainbow on the front, torn blue jeans, a short black coat, and carrying a duffel bag over his shoulder.

He had a mop of shaggy black hair atop his head, with a few streaks of white in it, as for his eyes, well, they attracted even more attention than the rest of him.

A red right eye and a SILVER left eye.

He looked up at the city before him, an amused smile at his lips, before looking up at the tall building that was Genmu Corporation.

He chuckled a bit. "I'm finally home."

* * *

 **And done!**

 **Wow! Even I didn't expect such a big chapter!**

 **Also, mystery silver eye user! And why does he only have one?**

 **You'll see soon enough.**

 **Anyway, I hope you enjoyed this everyone, and See you Next Game.**


	8. Level 3

**Hello everyone and welcome back to Gamer Hunters!**

 **So, today is probably not what you're expecting, or maybe it is, I don't know, why am I even saying this?**

 **Because I can.**

 **Anyway...**

 **GAME START!**

* * *

The sun was started to peak over the horizon at Beacon academy.

Most students were still asleep, some because they liked to sleep, some because they were tired from the initiation.

Though, some students were early risers… but none rose as early as a certain student.

Letting out a short yawn, Edler got up in his bed, rubbing the sleep out of his eyes.

Slowly, he got out of bed, shuffling over to his bag, rummaging through it, before pulling out… a candy bar.

With his sweet tooth quickly satisfied (and his brain jump started from the dose of sugar), Edler stretched a bit, before looking over at the clock in the room.

6:00 AM, just as usual.

After checking around the room, and making sure the bookshelf they'd put in front of the door to keep the fangirls out (a reaction to everyone realising there was a superhero team on campus, coupled with the usual reaction Edler got) was still in place, he grabbed his clothes for the day and went into the bathroom to take a shower.

As soon as the water turned on, the sound woke up Natt, who shot up from his bed and tried to reach for a weapon, only to pause as he remembered where he was.

Looking around the room a bit, he focused on the bathroom door, before looking at the beds and realising Edler was up before he was… again.

"Guess the surgeon's an early bird." he muttered before getting out of bed and walking to Ai's bed, shaking the racer's shoulder, who shifted a bit before opening his eyes.

"It's morning, we're taking our showers and then heading for breakfast before going to the first class." Natt said simply, with Ai nodding as he sat up with a yawn.

Just as Natt was about to wake up Retsu, Ai waved his hand in the negative "You won't be able to, only his alarm can wake him up."

Natt sighed at that, before seeing that Retsu's alarm clock wasn't set for another good half hour at least.

"Thankfully, I downloaded the sound of his alarm into my scroll." Ai said as he got up and grabbed his scroll, before walking up to Retsu's bed, and playing the alarm that Retsu used, making the gamer slowly get up, well, after he tried to hit the snooze button on his alarm, only for the sound to keep going.

"Morning already?" he mumbled as he looked around, still somewhat half asleep as his hair was pressing down on the orange side, being fully teal at the moment.

"Yeah, and try and set your clock a little earlier from now on, the genius surgeon apparently wakes up super early, so it seems we'll be following his example." Natt said as he sat back down on his bed.

"Yeah, sure, just don't wake me up super early on weekends since we don't have classes on those days." Retsu said with a yawn.

Ai snorted "No promises."

"I will end you." Retsu hissed at him.

"Funny, that's what I thought yesterday." Ai said with an annoyed glare.

The two glared at each for a few moments still, until they smirked and laughed a bit.

After that the three of them simply waited for Edler to come out of the shower, followed by each of them taking their turns.

Once everyone was ready, they moved the bookshelf out of the way and left their room, locking it behind them as they went to the cafeteria for breakfast.

On the walk to the cafeteria, Retsu fiddled with the tie that Edler had tied for him, trying to loosen it, until he ultimately pulled it off while muttering "Stupid deathtraps, I like being able to breath." he said while stuffing it in his pocket.

They ended up being finished with breakfast rather quickly though, as they still had plenty of time until their first class.

"My equipment isn't getting here until next week, so I can't start recording anything just yet." Retsu said with a sigh as they walked around campus.

"Equipment?" Edler questioned in confusion.

"Yeah, stuff for filming, my computer, and all my game consoles, I only brought a few portable ones in my pockets for now." Retsu explained simply with a shrug.

'This guy…' the other three all thought at the same time, looking at their teammate blankly.

The four kept on walking around the campus after that, not having anything better to do for now until their first class started to roll around.

At least this way they could become familiar with the place.

Eventually though, they made their way to their first class, taught by one Doctor Oobleck.

They were simply waiting for the class to start, though they had to wonder where teams RWBY and JNPR are.

Just as they thought that, the two teams burst through the door… or rather, tried to, as all eight of them were stuck in the doorway.

Everyone, the teacher included, just stared at them as they tried to struggle through.

Eventually, Retsu got up and walked to the door, looking at everyone stuck there, before grabbing Ruby by her arms and pulling her through.

While Ruby landed on her feet, everyone else fell into a pile on the ground.

Ruby looked at everyone as they tried to untangle themselves, before looking at Retsu and smiling a bit "Thanks."

"No problem." Retsu said with a small smile before walking back to his spot and sitting back down.

Not long after that, class finally started, and it was… fast.

Way too fast.

It didn't take long for Retsu's head to hit his desk since he was unable to follow what the teacher was saying.

Ai looked like his brain had short-circuited, turned into mush, and was leaking out of his ears.

Natt's left eye was twitching, periodically switching between normal and with a crosshair, even then he couldn't follow the teacher.

And Edler's head was moving back and forth between his notes and the teacher one would worry about him having whiplash.

The class continued on in that regard for the remaining time as well.

Once it was over, Retsu slowly lifted his head off the desk "Edler, you took notes right?" he asked sleepily.

"Somehow… yes, I managed to note everything important." Edler muttered, honestly wondering how he managed to do that.

"Mind if I copy them down later?" Retsu asked while glancing at him.

"No issue." Edler replied with a sigh, before looking at the gamer "You're more of the hands on type aren't you?"

"Yeah, I learn better by doing than by hearing." Retsu said with a nod.

"Fair enough." Edler muttered as their team got up and left the room.

Just as they were outside however, the speaker's turned on, and they heard the deputy headmistresses voice "Would team SBLE please report to the elevator for a special orientation?"

The four boys slowly stared at each other once the speaker turned off.

"I'm hoping that was literal and the teacher isn't a man-eater." Ai said with a dry chuckle, followed by Retsu busting a gut.

When they did get to the elevator, they were met with Spring waiting for them.

"Yo." Retsu said with a wave and a small grin.

Sure she was Chroma's daughter, and he didn't really trust the man yet, but he got good vibes from her.

She greeted them with a bow and a short smile "Pleasure to see you all again, I trust you're all doing well?"

"More or less." Natt answered with a shrug.

"The first class was rather difficult to follow, but besides that, everything is well." Edler added.

She nodded "Good. Now, I was sent here to show you something beneath the school."

"What? Some kind of vault?" Ai said jokingly.

"Trust me, it's more unique than a simple vault." Spring said simply as she opened the elevator.

The four of them walking inside with her, the doors closing as she pressed a button on the number pad.

Except the button she pushed didn't have a number, but two letters.

CR.

Retsu's eyes widened a bit when he noticed this and fought hard to hide his grin.

When they finally reached the designated floor, the doors slid open, letting them walk in.

Retsu looked around with a small grin, it looked exactly like it did in the show, save for being larger and with better looking equipment.

There was even a small room that contained an arcade cabinet for Doremifa Beat. Seeing the arcade cabinet made him wonder if they would be having Poppy as a navigator too, just like the show.

Edler looked around the immediate area, before walking to a window which seemed to be overlooking an operation room… and a few other windows next to it with identical rooms, before turning back and walking over to the medical equipment, picking up a few of them and examining them with a critical eye "Everything is state of the art from the looks of it."

"I guess if you're saying so it has to be true." Natt said while looking over the white board that seemed to have a few random notes scribbled onto it, from the looks of it they were notes on… game characters? He could see attack patterns and possible actions by a few different characters, with names like Salty, Alhambra, Revol and Motors.

"That's information on the four bugsters that dad has fought so far, they've constantly been respawning over the years, though recently he was able to introduce a partial vaccine into their coding so their level dropped down, since they just kept getting stronger." Spring explained as she stepped closer to Natt, who nodded before he studied the notes more closely.

"Is he gonna keep using it to keep them easy for us?" Ai asked as he sat down at the table.

Spring shifted a bit "Actually…"

* * *

 _3 years ago_

Chroma was working on his computer, with Spring typing up her homework on her laptop while sitting down at a coffee table, before she paused as a thought crossed her mind "Hey dad?"

Chroma looked up from his work "Yes Spring?"

"What happens if a Bugster is destroyed while at the maximum level?" she asked, rather curious.

Chroma opened his mouth to answer… only to pause as he realised he didn't actually have one.

If one were to look inside his head, they could see a loading screen slowly filling up.

Seconds later, his eyes lit up with an idea "That could work." he mumbled as he started typing away faster than before.

Spring looked at him for a few moments before shrugging and going back to her homework.

* * *

 _Present_

All 4 boys stared at Spring for a few moments, unsure what to say to that.

"Please tell me their levels are low at the moment." Retsu nearly begged, he did NOT feel like getting his ass handed to him by Salty of all people.

"Dad was nice enough to use the vaccine again a month ago when they last popped up, we haven't seen them since then." Spring said, eliciting sighs of relief from the four boys.

"So…" Retsu hiked his thumb at the arcade cabinet "Are you gonna explain that?"

Spring smiled a bit wider as everyone turned at the mentioned arcade "About that…" she said, stepping closer to it, before suddenly… spinning on herself?

"Costume change!" she exclaimed while surrounded by several lights, sparkles, and musical notes.

When the light show was done, in Spring's place stood Poppy Pipopapo, the mascot of Genmu Corporation.

Retsu grinned a bit in amusement while the other three were dumbfounded as to what had just happened.

She smiled brightly and raised her hand up "The name's Poppy Pipopapo! Pleasure to meet you! You could say I'm you're navigator, and a pseudo-bugster."

They all blinked at that "Pseudo-bugster?" Ai asked in confusion.

Poppy nodded "I was born from data of the Doremifa Beat video game when it was still in planning, mixed with some DNA from my parents."

"Your father is Chroma… but who is your mother?" Edler asked with a raised eyebrow.

"I haven't really met her yet, dad said she's a bit of a vagabond, she's been exploring every inch of Remnant since even before my creation. I know she's alive though, she sent dad a letter not too long ago that said she'll be coming back soon. Oh! And her name is Sapphire." Poppy explained it all with a smile as she sat down.

"So, you'll be having a family reunion soon then." Natt said in amusement.

"Yeah… but that's only if my big brother shows up." Poppy said, sighing at the end.

The boys stared blankly for a few seconds, before they all spoke at the same time "Huh?"

"I have a big brother. He's a game designer at Genmu Corp, and just like me, he's a pseudo-bugster, born from game data from several different games, and, like me, DNA from mom and dad. He went on a trip a few months before you four arrived on Remnant though, he was trying to get some ideas for new games." she explained, smiling a bit as she thought of her brother.

"What's his name?" Retsu asked, honestly curious.

"Duo Prisma, head designer for Perfect Puzzle and a few other games." Poppy said jovially. "In fact, I think he should be coming home by now."

* * *

The front door at Genmu Corp was dramatically kicked open, making a few people, mostly new employees, jump in surprise, followed by a young man's voice calling out "Ore Sanjou!"

"Duo's back." several employees mumbled in deadpan, knowing only one person besides the CEO who talked in the old Mistralian dialect.

"Who?" a new employee asked one of the employees in the know.

"Duo, he's the CEO's son and a lead designer for a few games, he took a trip about a year ago to get new game ideas, but he's been keeping in touch with his team through scroll contact." the older employee answered the newbie "If you ever get put on his team… you're going to be shaking your head at some of the things he does, trust me, he's pretty weird."

"I think it's hereditary, the CEO is pretty hair brained himself apparently when no one's around, rumor has it he's a retired huntsman, and you know how huntsman are." another employee chimed in.

"They all have something that makes them completely weird and/or crazy." the first employee shot back.

"Why are we even working here then?" the newbie asked, clearly confused.

"Boss may be crazy, but at least he's a good boss." the second employee said with a nod.

"Try finding another company that actually has this good of a pay, amazing hours, and free healthcare for its employees." the first employee added, making the newbie pause before nodding with a sigh.

Meanwhile, at the top floor, Chroma chuckled as his receptionist on the first floor had called ahead to let him know of his son's return, and that he was already acting like his usual self "Just as crazy as I am."

His office door suddenly opened, thankfully not harshly like the front door of the lobby, letting his son enter, revealing him to be the young man with a red right eye and a silver left eye who had arrived in Vale late the previous day "I'm home dad."

Chroma stood up from his seat and walked up to him "Welcome home son." he said and shook his son's hand "I trust you found some good inspiration out there?"

"Plenty, even started drawing up plans for some new games." Duo said as he walked over to a plush sofa chair near the coffee table and sat down on it, kicking his legs over the armrest.

"Glad to hear that." Chroma said with a smile as he sat across from him.

"I think I even saw mom at one point." Duo added, making Chroma blink in surprise.

"Did you now? Did you go talk to her?" he asked his son in honest curiosity.

Duo shook his head "Naw, I mean, would she have believed me in the first place? She didn't give birth to me, even if I have some of her DNA. Sure, the silver eye might help my credibility, since that's a pretty rare thing to have, but still."

Chroma shrugged his shoulders "Fair point. Sometimes I wonder if she'll believe Poppy does have her DNA since the silver eye gene reacted so differently in her."

"Pink eyes are also pretty rare, but there isn't anything special with them besides being a rare color." Duo added with a nod.

He then looked at his father a bit more seriously "And… about the stolen games…"

Chroma sighed. "Very little luck I'm afraid, but, there have been more virus outbreaks a of late… I think some of the higher ups in the leading Bugsters are in town and spreading the virus, one of them is bound to have some of the data."

"I hope it's Knock-Out Fighter. I worked hard on that, and those bastards stole it." Duo said with an annoyed growl.

Chroma nodded "Don't worry, we'll get it back in due time."

* * *

After getting a tour of the CR's facilities from Poppy/Spring (and Retsu played a game of Doremifa Beat with her) the boys were walking to their next class of the day, currently in the afternoon, since during the first week, the workload was light to allow students to adjust.

"So, how do you think our next class is going to be?" Retsu asked, his hair currently on orange.

"No clue, hopefully it's better than the last one." Ai said, groaning just by remembering the previous class.

"I doubt it'll be so bad, it's not like we'll end up with another teacher who has a quirky nature that renders his class almost impossible to do." Edler said, waving off their concern.

Minutes later, Edler was on the receiving end of two glares from his teammates, one from Ai, and the other from Natt.

Retsu was currently indisposed due to falling asleep almost immediately...and the sad part was nobody could blame him. The teacher, Professor Port, was droning on and on.

"I swear to god Edler." Ai muttered under his breath in annoyance as he tried to stay awake.

"Do the heavens feel like playing around with my existence?" Edler muttered, trying to ignore the glares of his teammates which were getting unnerving, as well as his eyelids drooping slightly before snapping back open.

Out of all of them Natt was the only one with no issues staying awake, having had to deal with long period of times where nothing happened while hunting, so he got used to staying awake when he was utterly bored and tired.

But even then, he was still yawning a bit from time to time as he listened to the teacher.

Soon, Professor Port reached what everyone believed to be the conclusion of his tall tale "The moral of this story? A true huntsman must be honorable. A true huntsman must be dependable. A true huntsman must be strategic, well-educated and wise!"

Natt, Edler and Ai nodded in agreement with that, glad the teacher was able to do his job partially right.

"So, who amongst you believe yourself to be the embodiment of these traits." Port continued, looking around the class curiously.

Weiss was about to shoot her hand up, being currently irritated as Ruby was acting rather childishly, before a voice cut off that action.

"No one here is a pure embodiment of those traits." Edler started, gaining the attention of all the class, even Retsu if the fact his light snoring had stopped. "All of us are students, teenagers even, an age where we still have much to learn before we can even consider ourselves as one of those things. If anybody here actually believes themselves to be a perfect representation of what the teacher has described, then you have too large an ego and need someone to remind you that you are still a child in the eyes of the world."

Port stared at Edler for several moments, before laughing lightly and smiling. "Perfect, that's the exact answer I was looking for, though, I probably would have minced words, but yours was straight to the point and got the job done. Yes students, Mister Ritter is completely right, none of you are a true representation of those qualities, not yet anyway, but, with careful training, you all will be someday."

He looked around the room for several moments, before nodding to himself when he saw that everyone had been listening to those last few moments "Now then, even with that said, why don't we have someone show off some of what they can do a bit, I'm sure you'd all like a bit of action even after the initiation yesterday." he said before walking off towards a somewhat large door to the side of the class and dragging a medium sized cage out of it, which held a growling and snarling Boarbatusk that was trying to break free.

"Now, any volunteers?" Port asked with a raised eyebrow.

Retsu's head shot up along with his body and his arm "I'm bored as all heck, so you got yourself a volunteer right here!"

Port chuckled in amusement at him, before nodding "Then go and grab your gear and head straight back here."

Retsu nodded before walking out of the class, leaving behind the mutters of confusion and wonder, all asking the same thing.

How does a gamer actually fight?

Minutes later, Retsu walked back in, wearing his outfit from the initiation, twirling his weapon in his fingers.

He'd heard them murmuring amongst themselves as he walked in, wondering just how he was going to do, with the more cocky students mentioning how it would be fun to see him get beaten by a grimm.

Well, it seems he'd have to put on a bit of a show.

As he stood in front of the cage, he smirked as he activated his weapon, deploying the energy mallet and resting it on his shoulder "I'll clear this with no continues." he said, just loud enough for others to hear him.

Port chuckled lightly, before chopping off the lock of the cage with his blunderbuss/axe, the boarbatusk bursting out of it while squealing like an angry pig, something which made a few people laugh, before charging at Retsu, intent on ramming him down.

Everyone wondered what Retsu would do, all of them thinking what his first action would be after dodging the charge.

All of them save for team RWBY, sitting in the front row, and all noticing that Retsu was standing firm, no sign of him about to move in his body, all of them the same question at their minds 'What is he doing?'

Moments before the boarbatusk made contact, they got their answer as Retsu's body flashed.

The boarbatusk hit it's target dead on, bringing several gasps of shock from the class, but not for the reasons one would expect.

Instead of a body being sent flying, a pair of tusks were broken off with a loud clang as they made contact with metal.

Stunned silence enveloped the room as everyone stared at Retsu's metal coated body.

Retsu chuckled, a sound which echoed, almost like even his insides were coated in metal "You all act like you've never seen someone use a power up before. Though… I guess you haven't seen them in real life huh? I guess my semblance is great like that, it's why I like to call it 'Game World'."

The silence continued, though for some people it came with the dawning realization of his semblance having essentially giving him a power up, just like in platforming games, the most well known probably being Super Mario, where the Metal power up originated from.

As for the boarbatusk, it was slowly looking down at it's broken tusks while slowly backing away, coupled with a dawning realization that it was going to die.

Yes, most grimm were mindless beasts, but even the younger ones were able to (rarely) realise they were fucked.

Back to Retsu, eventually his power up blinked out of existence, returning him to normal, looking around at everyone to see they were still stunned, including the grimm, so he simply grinned as he put his arms behind his head and waited around for a few seconds, before his body flashed once more, this time concentrating more on his clothes than just his whole body.

With the light gone, his coat was now colored a warm white, with his pants being magenta colored. He grinned, as with a snap of his fingers, a magenta colored fireball appeared in his hand, chucking it at the grimm, who reacted too slowly, and thus had it's fur set on fire.

Retsu watched with a laugh as the grimm ran around, squealing while it was on fire, turning off his power up on his own, and waiting a few seconds before activating another one, this one turning his coat an icy blue with his pants being magenta again, and instead of a fire ball in his hand, he created an icy blue sphere that gave off an aura of cold, chucking it at the grimm and immediately putting out the flames while also encasing it in a block of ice.

Everyone stared in amazement, even his teammates, as they saw him shoot out both fire and ice from his hands, his power up eventually running out, as the murmuring returned, with a lot of people noticing how, once more, he just used two classic Super Mario power ups.

"That's so cool." Ruby breathed in awe as she practically had stars in her eyes.

"It's definitely not something you see everyday." Blake said with a raised eyebrow.

"Kinda makes me want to fight him." Yang added with a grin.

Meanwhile, Weiss was holding her head in her hands, muttering how none of this was making any sense, and she didn't mean the fact he could use power ups, but more on how stupidly diverse his semblance was. At least everything sort of fit together according to how he described it at the beginning.

Retsu looked over the ice cube of a grimm, before grinning wickedly as he swung his mallet onto it at full force, cracking it as it slid around.

When he stepped closer to it, he looked at it a little, before his hair changed sides to orange, and his mallet fizzled out, quickly being replaced with an orange blade.

"Enough playing around." he muttered in a bit of annoyance, and with a calm swing, he cut the ice block in half, grimm included, leaving it on the floor as he deactivated his weapon and returned to his seat.

"Well done young man, a fine example of how to overpower one's opponent." Port said with a nod of approval while everyone else in the classroom was stunned in silence once more, this time because of how quickly the fight had ended.

Ruby however, was silent because she was confused.

Throughout most of the fight, Retsu had been grinning or smiling in amusement, his hair constantly on teal, and then, for no reason, he became annoyed with his hair shifting to orange.

Why would he suddenly be annoyed, heck, exactly WHAT had made him annoyed?

What's more, she had this nagging feeling in the back of her head whenever she looked at his weapon, something about it she couldn't quite remember, because she was positive she'd seen something similar to it before.

When class was over, Retsu was picking up his things silently, before looking up to see Jaune walking towards him, having been on the other side of the classroom with his team.

"Hey, Retsu, how come you just, well, ended the fight like that? Felt a bit… dry if you get what I mean?" Jaune asked, honestly confused about what he had seen.

Retsu looked at him for a moment, before shrugging "It was weak, and I felt I had wasted enough time playing around with it. It's really no fun fighting something that can barely fight back."

Jaune looked at him a bit, the answer making him slightly uneasy "What would you do against a weak human opponent though?"

Retsu shrugged "Depends on how much brains they show really, I mean, you can never be too careful with humans, their the most unpredictable species out there."

Jaune blinked as he processed that, and couldn't help but agree with that logic.

"Anyway, I'll see ya some other time Jaune." Retsu said with a small smirk as he waved before walking off back to his room.

As he walked, he passed by Weiss, who seemed to be deep in thought while slowly trudging back to her own room, shrugging it off as nothing much as he simply continued on.

* * *

 **And there you go!**

 **So yeah, mostly some exposition, which trust me, it was needed.**

 **Before anybody complains to me that Poppy's origin is wrong, this is her origin for my story.**

 **This isn't the show, this is another reality where things are different.**

 **As for Duo, welp, those who were thinking he was going to be the Knock-Out Fighter user, sorry to say you were wrong.**

 **Anyway, hope you liked the chapter, and see you all next time.**


	9. Level 4

**Hello everyone and welcome back to yet another Gamer Hunters.**

 **There isn't much to say, so sit back and enjoy.**

 **GAME START!**

* * *

The bell rung as class let out at Beacon Academy, students filling out with currently nothing to do until the next class of the day.

"Well, that was… something." Ai muttered, not sure how else to put it.

"Definitely not something you'd expect to see for real." Natt agreed with a nod.

"I didn't think it was physically possible." Edler added, still shocked at what he saw.

Retsu was silent, his hair on teal, until he looked back up "Our teacher is a freaking loli of all things, but she's older than us… that's just so weird and cool at the same time, is that normal?"

"Probably not." Ai said with a shrug.

Retsu shrugged, his hair shifting to orange "I guess, but normal is overrated anyway, right?"

"Can't argue with that." Natt said with a smirk.

They kept on walking for several minutes, until they were interrupted by someone getting in their way.

Natt looked up with a raised eyebrow at the slightly taller boy that was Cardin Winchester "Can we help you?"

Cardin smirked down at them "Well if it isn't the resident heroes." he said, his voice dripping with sarcasm.

Retsu groaned quietly "Oh god not this bullshit."

"What is this, a highschool drama?" Ai muttered in deadpan.

"Nuisance." Edler mumbled lowly.

Natt sighed, before looking back up at the slightly taller boy "Look, can we not do this? We really don't care what your opinion of us is, so just let us go on, alright?"

"Not so fast." Cardin said, stepping forward, along with his teammates who stepped into view, all of them trying to look intimidating "We ain't going anywhere until we get what we want?"

"And what exactly do you want?" Edler asked, clearly annoyed while Natt rolled his shoulders in case things got ugly.

"A fight. See, I don't think you're as great as you're trying to make people think, so I want you four to transform, so I can kick your asses and show them how useless you are." Cardin said with a sneer.

The boys looked at him dryly for several seconds, before glancing at each other, and all looking back at him, with Retsu deciding to answer him.

"Honestly, we don't even need our drivers to kick your sorry asses, hell, bet I could do it easy." Retsu said, waving them away like one would to a child.

His teammates tried, and failed, to hide their amusement, all of them either laughing or smiling in some way.

And naturally, Cardin saw red "Then I guess I'll just take it from you after I kick your ass." Cardin seethed before bull rushing Retsu.

The gamer simply rose an eyebrow, before jumping and somersaulting over Cardin, turning around to kick him in the back of the head, knocking him flat on the ground, with Retsu blinking in surprise "That's it?"

"I believe you hit a weak point in the human body with that kick of yours, it happens in rare cases." Edler said as he checked Cardin's pulse before nodding to himself and getting up, looking at one of the bully's teammates "Get him back to his bed and put an icepack on his head, when he wakes up, make him take two aspirins every 6 hours." he said, the three lackeys dumbfounded before he clicked his teeth in irritation "This century if possible!" he said more forcefully, making them jump before scrambling to lift up the knocked out idiot and carrying him away.

Ai chuckled as he watched them scramble away "Well, hopefully he'll learn his lesson."

"Probably not, he'll keep on trying until he's either expelled or we beat him so badly he's in the hospital." Natt said with a sigh as they started walking again.

Their next interruption, wasn't by a person, but by a sound, and this one was far more serious.

They all turned to Edler, who he himself was grabbing his special stethoscope he had found in his locker "It's beeping?"

"An emergency call, that means someone's been admitted into the CR and we need to handle their operation." Retsu said, fully serious.

"Let's go then." Natt said, the others nodding as they ran for the elevator, riding it down to the CR floor, entering the room to find Spring waiting there for them.

"Where's the patient?" Edler asked seriously.

"Vale hospital, I'll tell you more once we get there, first though, you three." she pointed at Retsu, Ai and Natt, before pointing to a coat hanger that had three white coats on it "Put those on, it'll help calm the patient if they think you're doctors."

The three nodded and pulled off their uniform's coats, replacing them with the white doctor's ones, Edler not needing too as he already wore his white coat over his beacon uniform, feeling more at ease with it on.

Spring nodded when she saw them changed, before smiling a bit "My turn now. Costume change!" just like the last time, she spun and was surrounded in light, sparkles and musical notes, this time coming out of it while wearing a soft pink nurse's outfit and a more relaxed haircut.

Retsu stared at her for a few moments, before blushing slightly as he mumbled "Cute.", followed by shaking his head a bit as his hair shifted back to mostly teal, his blush easily disappearing.

Though, Spring seemed to have noticed, and smiled a bit, not seeming to mind it, before getting serious again "We'll be taking the shuttle loop to get to the CR in downtown Vale."

"Shuttle loop?" Ai asked in confusion as Spring stepped up to a wall, putting hand on it and sliding it to the side, revealing a panel with several numbered buttons, pressing them in a specific order, and a hidden door revealing itself in the wall, walking through the hole with the boys following after her.

The best way they could describe what they saw would be some sort of subway train car, but more futuristic.

"The shuttle loop is something dad designed and helped build with the help of a few other companies, it connects to the CR centers in Vale, Vacuo, Mistral, and Atlas, the shuttle moves at speeds that can put most muscle cars to shame, for example, the trip from here to the Vale hospital will only take a minute." Spring explained, pressing even more buttons on the side of the shuttle, opening it up and walking inside of it, the others following inside, seeing several seats lining the two walls, along with one seat in front of a set of controls, which Spring sat in and strapped herself in, prompting the four boys to look at each other and sit down on the seats lining the walls and strapping on their own seat belts.

"Hold on tight, or you might get whiplash." Spring said as she pressed a few more keys and then pushed a lever forward.

Nothing happened for a second, before the shuttle moved, quickly picking up speed before moving like a bullet.

The boys all held onto their seats tightly, surprised by how fast the shuttle was going, before eventually slowing down after a minute, quickly reaching a stop, though thankfully nothing jarring.

They all took a moment to get their bearings, before following the waiting Spring into the CR proper, finding it looked similar to how it did at Beacon, only larger, though once more there was an arcade for Doremifa Beat tucked away in a corner.

Besides that, they noticed the presence of someone else in the room with them.

"Glad to see you boys made it." Chroma said while standing in front of them with his own doctor's coat, and an actual identification pinned on it.

Edler narrowed his eyes on it, before they widened in surprise "You're an actual doctor?"

Chroma nodded with a smile "I took classes when I was younger and ended up with my own PhD in medical science. That, and I've also handled plenty of operations in my life."

"How good are you?" Retsu asked, honestly curious.

Chroma smirked in amusement "I've helped deliver several dozen babies in my career, how good do you think that makes me?"

"I'd say plenty good to be called an actual doctor." Ai admitted.

Chroma smiled before walking down the winding staircase with the four boys "I'll be overseeing the operation to make sure everything goes well, as well as be able to step in should things get out of hand. Here, these certify you as able to handle Game Disease." he said while handing all four of them identification tags, which they clipped onto their coats, though Edler's had more information on it, making him smile a bit that he was now able to fully work.

"Patient's name is Verde Pier, a friend of his called the hospital a hour ago to alert us of his symptoms, thankfully he's been staying calm and patient up till now." Spring said as she walked down the stairs with a clipboard in hand, before handing it to Edler who looked the information over, nodding slightly.

"Now then, let's get to work boys." Chroma said, stepping towards the door, which opened to let him, along with the four boys, while Spring went back upstairs to watch from the window.

A young man with forest green hair and brown eyes looked up as the doors opened, getting up and supporting himself with his elbows "Um, hello doctors." he said, a bit nervous.

"Good day Mr. Pier, my name is Doctor Prisma, these four young men here will be performing the operation today under my supervision, they are Doctors Jeger, Ritter, Sudu and Plaiy." Chroma said pleasantly while motioning to the boys.

The patient nodded in greeting "Hi, um, my name is Verde Pier, owner of the Pier and son antique emporium."

"You have a son?" Retsu asked curiously as he went to the side to look and see if he could figure out how to activate the scanning portion of the machine.

Verde shook his head "No, I inherited the place from my father, so, the name is a bit misleading now I guess." he said while laughing awkwardly.

"Well, I'm sure that'll change one day." Natt said with a calm smile, with Verde laughing a bit.

"Ah, this one right here." Retsu said as he had found the correct button "Please lie back down sir." he asked the patient who complied and lied down on his back, just as Retsu pushed the button and a piece of the large machine slowly raised up and pivoted on itself before activating, a soft green light shining on the patient's body as it moved up and down slowly, showing his vitals on the monitor behind his head, and on the one on the side, they could see the strain of the bugster virus infecting him, represented by a yellow star.

"That's… Salty, if I remember correctly, right?" Retsu asked, looking to Chroma, who nodded at him.

Edler stepped forward, strapping his Gamer Driver to his waist, the others all doing the same, Chroma included "Commencing Bugster removal operation." he said as all five of them activated their gashats.

" **TADDLE QUEST!"**

" **BAKUSOU BIKE!"**

" **MIGHTY ACTION X!"** (X2)

" **BANG BANG SHOOTING!"**

"Henshin." the five of them called out together, as they inserted their gashats, and entered Level 1, the four boys casting a glance at Genmu to see he looked much like Ex-Aid even in this form.

Apparently their transforming had caught the virus's attention, as the patient winced in pain before his body was covered in orange pixels that started rising up and forming a Bugster Union.

"Not here, let's take this somewhere else." Genmu said as he pressed the Stage Select button, and ended up taking everyone to a quarry while he stood away from the action and simply watched.

The Bugster Union had been pulled along with them, and ended up taking the same golem like shape they'd seen during the initiation.

"This thing again huh?" Snipe muttered as he looked up at the creature.

"I doubt it'll be as easy as last time though." Brave said as he called forth his weapon, an action copied by Snipe and Ex-Aid, while Lazer simply readied the weapons he already had.

Quickly, they moved, Snipe and Lazer jumping back while Ex-Aid and Brave rushed in.

They settled on a similar tactic to the last time, except Ex-Aid was constantly attacking the union's face to keep it from retaliating at Brave, who attacked both its legs and its arms this time, with Snipe and Lazer keeping its attention split further by firing at it from two different sides.

Suddenly, Ex-Aid jumped up, using the Gashacon Breaker to open a box above him, and seeing a purple energy item with the image of a rider on it with swirly eyes and question marks around it's head.

He chuckled lightly, before using his weapon to send it flying at the bugster " **CONFUSE!"** which started to stumble around drunkenly, leaving itself wide open.

"Let's try this one." Brave said as he opened a treasure chest, finding a pale red energy item with the image of a rider stretching his arm forward, the medal flying into him " **STRETCH!"** making him shiver for a moment, before throwing his arm outward, being slightly surprised to see it actually stretch outwards, before focusing back on the bugster, grasping his weapon tightly and sending his arms up, only instead of his arms stretching, the blade did, before he brought it down on an overhead strike, going clean through the bugster.

The bugster fell to it's knees, before separating into several smaller clusters of orange pixels, which quickly took form, most of them appearing as bugster grunts dressed like cooks, except for one bugster who stood out from the others.

The bugster's body was primarily blue, wearing a black top hat and cape, his left arm looked more like some kind of weapon than a hand.

This was Salty Bugster, based on Baron Salty from Mighty Action X.

Salty shook his body slightly as he stood straight "Ah, it's been a little while since I last emerged, now, wonder who the poor sap is this time?"

He looked around, only to come face to face with the riders after looking behind himself, staying silent for several moments, before sighing as he hunched forward "Is it really too much to ask to NOT face one of these guys? Especially since there's 4 of them now?! Rargh! This is making me so damn salty and the fight hasn't even started yet!"

"Hold up, you're going to feel even saltier!" Ex-Aid called out with a laugh, before he and the others, minus Genmu, reached for their drivers.

"Dai Henshin!"

"Skill level two."

"Second Tactic."

" **MIGHTY JUMP! MIGHTY KICK! MIGHTY, MIGHTY ACTION X!"**

" **TADDLE MEGURU! TADDLE MEGURU! TADDLE QUEST!"**

" **BA-BA-BANG! BANG-BA-BANG! (YOW!) BANG BANG SHOOTING!"**

Lazer paused as his hand grasped the lever of his driver "Time to see if what you told me yesterday was true Mr. CEO!" he said, catching everyone's attention, while Genmu smirked lightly behind his helmet, as Lazer opened his driver, before immediately closing it and opening it again.

" **GEAR SHIFT! BAKUSOU! DOKUSOU! GEKISOU! BOUSOU! BAKUSOU BIKE!"**

Where everyone expected to see a motorcycle standing, they instead saw something different.

Lazer stood, on two legs, with two actual arms, his body covered in a featureless black undersuit, with a yellow chest armor over his upper torso, and yellow armored side skirts on his thighs, with two yellow pieces that both had gamepad buttons covering the top of his shoulders, his previous form's head was attached to his back, and the head that was normally attached to the front of the bike now looked like a proper helmet, the the back of said helmet was black and featureless for the most part. Beneath his aura and health gauges on his chest display, were his weapon icons, represented by a bow and a sickle.

Lazer grinned under his helmet as he cracked his neck "Glad to know I'm not stuck as a motorbike." he said, before summoning his weapon " **GASHACON SPARROW!"** dropping a yellow and black bow with a magenta bladed edge to it in his right hand.

"Alright! Nice job Lazer!" Ex-Aid said with a laugh while clapping his partner on the shoulder.

"Good to see you can fight on our level as well." Snipe said while lifting up the Gashacon Magnum.

"Hey! You salty jerks done ignoring me?!" Salty shouted at the riders.

The riders looked between each other at that, before looking back at Salty and all speaking together "No."

Salty slumped forward and fell to his hands and knees at that, while his grunts tried to cheer him up.

Off to the side, Genmu chuckled a bit at the four riders dismissing the bugster so casually.

While Salty was acting depressed however, the riders took their chance, with Lazer aiming, and shooting at the leading bugster, making him stumble to the ground, before rushing in with Ex-Aid and Brave, Snipe stepping forward slowly while firing his shots at the enemy.

Pressing his weapon's A button, Lazer split his weapon into two sickles, and started hacking away at the bugster in front of him, while Ex-Aid jumped around and used his own personal power-ups in combination with the basic Speed-Up and Muscular energy items, and Brave mowed down everything in his path, cutting the bugsters apart.

Without warning, Lazer, leaned to the left, avoiding an attack from a bugster that had attempted to sneak up on him, and it would have succeeded, had it not been for his semblance.

It was difficult to fully explain, but essentially, it gave him enhanced spacial awareness, faster reaction time, and a sort of danger sense, allowing him to dodge almost any and all attacks.

… and then Retsu had summed it up the other day as "Oh, so you have Observation Haki then, like in One Piece."

As Snipe continued to step forward with every shot, he soon started to kick at the bugsters to line them up with others, the eyes on his helmet turning into crosshairs and firing at several of them quickly.

This pretty much continued in a similar fashion for a few minutes, until Ex-Aid reached Salty and started fighting him directly.

 **(insert Stormy Story by Kamen Rider Girls)**

Ex-Aid kicked the bugster in the chest as he neared him, pushing him back a few feet as Salty looked up, and the rider could feel the glare directed at him "You're really making me salty right now you damn punk!"

Ex-Aid shook his head with a sigh "It's always salt this and salt that with you isn't it? Maybe you should try something sweet instead."

"I hate sweets!" Salty shouted, ticked off as he tried to hit Ex-Aid his left hand knuckle weapon…

… only for Ex-Aid to stop it by hitting the side of his arm with his mallet and then slashing across Salty's back "I know, that's why I recommend it." Ex-Aid responded, and you could just hear the smirk in his tone.

Salty roared in a combination of anger and exasperation at that comment, before rushing at Ex-Aid again, the rider dodging his attack and retaliating by slashing at his side.

"Is that seriously all you can do?" Ex-Aid asked tauntingly.

Salty growled as he prepared to try and attack again, before being shot in the back, making him stumble forwards before looking behind him, staring in shock as the other three riders were walking up to them, the lesser bugsters all eliminated.

"All that's left is you now." Snipe said as he cracked his fingers by flexing his hand.

"Show off." Lazer muttered lowly while looking at Snipe, before turning back to the bugster, which was trapped in between the four of them.

Salty looked all around himself, before slowly raising his hands in surrender "Uhh… truce?"

The riders looked at him, before Brave spoke "Do you actually think we're going to fall for that one?"

Salty slumped forward "It was worth a try."

The riders shook their heads, before readying themselves to attack and finish him off, until they had to move back to avoid an attack coming from higher ground, Ex-Aid almost being blasted off his feet since he was closer to it.

 **(end song)**

Salty took his chance, and ran into the smoke, getting some distance from the riders, while an unknown face to the riders jumped down in their path, with Salty staring at his savior.

It was Graphite, already in his bugster form, wielding his weapon in his hand and ready to attack.

"Salty! Get out of here! This is your chance!" Graphite shouted, snapping his fellow bugster out of his shock, making Salty bow his head in thanks as he ran further away, before disappearing in a cluster of screen glitches.

"Who are you?" Snipe asked as he eyed the new opponent, before the small heads up display in the corner of his eyesight flashed, showing him that the bugster before him was at Level 5 "Level 5?" he said in confusion and a bit of surprise.

"Three levels higher than us." Brave muttered as he saw the same thing.

"This could be tough." Lazer said as he gripped his sickles tighter.

Ex-Aid merely glared at the new opponent, recognizing him from the show "Graphite… an enemy character from Drago Knight Hunter Z." he said, loud enough for the others to hear him, making them nod in understanding.

Graphite scoffed lightly "I see you know who I am. That certainly makes things easier. Now, I'll make sure you don't bother us Bugster again, humans." he said, spitting the last word out with venom in his voice.

Just as he was about to attack, a jingle was heard, catching everyone's attention.

" **MIGHTY JUMP! MIGHTY KICK! MIGH~TY ACTIO~N X!"**

Graphite stumbled back as a laser blast hit him, before dodging backwards as Genmu jumped in, trying to kick him a few times while in his Level 2 form.

Graphite glowered at him in annoyance while Genmu stepped back closer to the boys "Be careful, his Level may seem low, but he's still dangerous, he's more skilled than other Bugsters."

Graphite scoffed at the words "And you would know why I'm better than others."

Genmu growled lowly at the words, before Snipe spoke "What does he mean by that?"

Genmu looked down at the words, feeling shame "Because he's a fully formed Bugster, created from someone I failed to save several years ago."

Ex-Aid stared at the black rider, he knew that Graphite was likely fully formed, but, he was surprised at how genuine Genmu's shame at his failure was.

Maybe… maybe he was different from Kuroto.

"But… I won't let that keep me down. So instead, I'll make sure they can be put to rest!" Genmu said, shooting Graphite again, who blocked the attack with his weapon.

The others took it as a signal to start attacking as well, going in with their partners, Ex-Aid rushing in and striking when Lazer took Graphite's attention with his weapon, and Brave and Snipe doing the same, knowing better than to attack without backup against a stronger opponent.

While the were doing that, Genmu was alternating between firing at Graphite and rushing in to try and shred at his body with his chainsaw.

Graphite growled as he pushed Ex-Aid away from himself after an overhead strike from the rider, jumping back a few feet to distance himself from the riders "I have to admit, you riders did better than I expected. It's useless however, my fellow Bugster has escaped, I don't need to be here anymore." he said, grasping his weapon tightly as it started to glow "Dragon Fang of Rage!" he shouted as he swung the blade down and then across, sending out an X shaped slash of energy near the riders, causing a large cloud of smoke to fall over them as they shielded themselves from the blast.

When the smoke cleared, they were disappointed to see that Graphite had run away.

Ex-Aid sighed as put away his weapon for now "Darn it, he got away."

Genmu nodded "While that is deplorable, we need to focus on finding Salty, most likely he's currently in Vale, attempting to wreak havoc around town."

Snipe nodded "Right, Brave, you and me will form one team, Ex-Aid and Lazer, you make another, we'll both be covering one half of the city each."

The other three riders nodded in agreement to the plan, as they all raced out of the quarry, Genmu observing them leave, looking on with a bit of pride.

"I knew I chose right." he said, crossing his arms and nodding slightly.

* * *

Lazer was currently in bike mode, with Ex-Aid riding on his back as the two searched through Vale, trying to find Salty, with no luck so far.

"You'd think a weird monster with a top hat, a cape, and a blue body would be standing out, but no, of course not, somehow he's able to hide himself." Ex-Aid muttered in annoyance at the fact Salty was so tough to find.

"Gotta agree with you there partner, doesn't help that the two of us stand out like two hairy thumbs. If only we knew what it was thinking." Lazer answered to his fellow rider, his eyes roving around the area underneath the helmet.

"What it's thinking…" Ex-Aid mumbled, deep in thought, before snapping his head up "Ah! That's right, I knew I was forgetting something!"

"What? What did you remember?" Lazer asked hurriedly, wondering what his partner was talking about.

"Stress, the bugster is going to want to cause stress to the patient, so they're going to go after something the patient holds dear." Ex-Aid said, revving the engine and speeding up while taking a sharp turn down a road.

"And you also realised what the bugster is going to attack, didn't you?" Lazer asked as he let his partner guide him while he concentrated on keeping their speed at optimum.

Ex-Aid nodded "Yeah, remember what the patient told us?"

Lazer thought for a few moments, before his eyes widenned "His store!"

Ex-Aid nodded again "Right! So come on! Let's go save an antique shop!" he said as they made another turn, coming onto the same street as the store.

"I see him!" Lazer said as he saw Salty sneaking out of an alley opposite of the story.

The two riders started to break, sliding down the road with a loud tire screeching sound, stopping right in front of the shop, with Salty staring at them blankly.

The bugster continued to stare for several seconds, before hunching forward "I really can't catch a break can't I?"

Ex-Aid chuckled as he stepped off of Lazer, the bike rider closing and quickly re-opening his Gamer Driver " **GEAR SHIFT!"** causing him to turn into his humanoid form again "Naw, I doubt you can, nor will you ever be able to." Ex-Aid said with a shrug, before snapping his fingers "Now, time to clear this with no continues!"

Salty started grumbling under his breath, before noticing something out of the corner of his eye, mentally making him cheer, as he turned to his left and ran at the window of the electronic's story, slamming his knuckle through the glass and straight into the TV.

"The hell? Did he go crazy?" Lazer said in surprise, while Ex-Aid readied himself for whatever the bugster was planning.

Just as the TV was starting to spark, orange pixels started pouring out of it, Salty removing his hand as the pixels into a group of bugsters around him, all in chef outfits "Now this is more like it. How do ya like that you salty bastards?!"

"I don't like it." Ex-Aid muttered in annoyance as he summoned his weapon in sword mode.

"Neither do I." Lazer agreed as he summoned his weapon in sickle mode.

"Think you can handle the grunts?" Ex-Aid asked lowly.

"If you can get big, blue and depressing's attention, yeah, I probably can." Lazer said back in the same tone.

Ex-Aid nodded, before the two of them ran into battle.

 **(Play Stormy Story by Kamen Rider Girls (again yes))**

The two riders cut down the grunt bugsters in their paths, with Ex-Aid running straight up to Salty and attacking him.

The bugster groaned as the attack hit him dead on, making him stumble back a few feet "You won't have it so easy this time, I swear!"

Ex-Aid scoffed "You're all bark and no bite."

Salty charged right at him, seeing red, and was shocked when Ex-Aid jumped high, and then continued jumping around the air, creating small platforms to land on, constantly getting higher and higher.

"Huh? What? Wait, what's he doing?" Salty said, completely confused.

Suddenly, he was shot in the back, making him stumble forwards, and then turn back to see that Lazer had taken out all of the grunts he had summoned.

"You know, people really should learn to be more aware of their surroundings, both up, and all around them." Lazer said, in a somewhat taunting tone.

"Why you…" Salty growled lowly as he readied to attack Lazer.

"Woah now! I'm not your opponent here man." Lazer said, pointing up, and suddenly reminding Salty of something very important.

"Ah damn it." the bugster muttered as he slowly looked up.

Ex-Aid jumped on a last platform after getting high up, panting a bit at what honestly felt like a decent exercise to him, before taking out his gashat from his belt, blowing on it, and inserting it into the slot in his weapon.

" **KIMEWAZA!"**

He took a deep breath, closing his eyes underneath his helmet, before opening them again, the platform disappearing from under his feet as he started free falling down, his sword charging up with energy.

Quickly, he kept getting closer and closer, until he reared back his weapon and hit the trigger, pushing the energy to it's peak.

" **MIGHTY CRITICAL FINISH!"**

With a shout, Ex-Aid swung his weapon on the stunned Salty, striking him and causing an explosion at the same time, the rush of wind keeping the rider afloat for a moment and taking away the momentum from his fall.

" **GAME CLEAR!"**

The words appeared overhead, making Lazer stare up at them while Ex-Aid was hunched over and taking deep breaths.

"You ok there partner?" Lazer asked as he turned to the other rider.

Ex-Aid nodded "Yeah, just, in retrospect, what I just did was kind of crazy, and, well, ascending too high too quickly makes air thinner, so you get less in, you know?"

Lazer nodded in understanding, though he was smiling in amusement underneath his helmet.

* * *

The riders all sat down in the CR, untransformed finally, with Chroma, smiling as he leaned against a wall.

"I have to admit, all of you did quite well for your first operation." he said with a nod of approval.

Spring nodded in agreement as she walked up from the stairs, being done discharging the patient since he was clear "Dad's right, the patient remained calm all throughout the operation, and you managed to avoid most damage."

"We're not paying for what Salty broke right?" Lazer asked quickly.

Chroma chuckled "No, Genmu Corporation will be handling all damages from the bugster." he said, prompting a sigh of relief from the racer.

Edler sighed a bit as he ate a small slice of cake "I wonder how often these operations will happen?"

"Hopefully not too often, it looks painful when the bugster tries to overtake you." Natt said while leaning back in his chair.

"Honestly, I wouldn't wish that on anyone." Retsu said, his hair on teal at the moment.

Chroma nodded at their words, before standing up straight "Thank you for your hard work today, you've all earned some rest until the next case pops up." he said, before leaving the room via elevator.

Spring said goodbye to her father, before turning to the boys with a smile "Come on, let's get you four back to Beacon."

The four of them nodded, standing up, with three of them hanging their white coats on a rack before leaving.

They'd done a good job, but it was only a matter of time until the next case popped up.

* * *

 **And there you go!**

 **First true Bugster case taken care of, and Graphite has revelaed himself fully to try and give Salty a fighting chance.**

 **More backstory on Genmu as well.**

 **And yes, the Gear Shift for Lazer is something I came up with for this story with some help from Timeless Dreamer Neo.**

 **If you have any questions, feel free to ask them, and please make an account if you do so, it's free, and I can answer you without everyone seeing the answer to your question, so, you know, it stays private.**

 **See you next game!**


	10. Level 5

**Hello everyone and welcome back!**

 **Now, today's chapter will show another interesting thing I'm adding to the story.**

 **You'll see what I mean you start reading.**

* * *

"...and in other news, the four newest Kamen Riders, since their first official debut with the defeat of a recent Bugster Outbreak, have really been making names for themselves with their quick work of routing the recent minor Bugster skirmishes over the last week. What are your thoughts on this Jeff?" the anchorwoman said to the anchorman next to her, Jeff.

"Well Janine, while it's clear from the fight that these four are still new to the job, seeing as their movements aren't QUITE as precise and trained as Genmu's, they're making up for it in teamwork and overall versatility. I'd say right now they're still rough around the edges, but give them enough time and I think the people of Remnant can rest easy knowing they now have 5 superheroes protecting them from the Bugster Menace," Jeff said, commenting as if from personal experience.

"And that's it for our latests headlines. The four new Kamen Riders: Ex-Aid, Brave, Snipe, and Lazer may have only just entered the world, and already they're the focus of the media…" Janine said...before the screen showing the news was turned off.

"Told you I made a good decision." Chroma said, looking quite smug from his smaller screen on one half of Ozpin's computer.

As for the other half, it was currently occupied by a thoughtful looking James Ironwood, General of the Atlas Military, and Headmaster of the Academy (something both Chroma and Ozpin thought should be separate).

"Perhaps…" Ironwood mused, before frowning. "However, there is something I'd like to ask, Chroma," he started. "I can't help but wonder where you found these four."

"You want to make that more precise?" Chroma said, lifting a bored eyebrow at the General "Just ask your real question."

Ironwood's frown deepened. "When I heard of the four new riders...and the fact that their identities were compromised due to their fellow students," he started, looking a little annoyed at that last bit remembering the story of how it happened. "I decided to look into the boys. Imagine my surprise when I found absolutely no records of them prior to a year ago. Care to explain?"

Chroma, for his part, yawned and acted the least bit interested one possibly could "Huh? What was that Jimmy? All I could hear was 5 to 0."

Ironwood frowned, taking a moment to realize that jab, before he suppressed a growl. Ever since Ozpin let this...lunatic….into their circle, they'd butted heads more than anyone else. It was honestly only because of his respect for Ozpin that he had kept his piece, but every time he had to deal with Chroma, he felt the urge to do something grow. "A point that wouldn't be a problem if you would just share your technology with the rest of Remnant," he pointed out. "The Bugsters became a danger rivalling or even surpassing the Grimm, and you were the first to develop a means to fight them, yet you insist on focusing your resources on...video games, and all sorts of entertainment when you could be focusing your resources on ending not just the Bugsters, but the Grimm too!" Ironwood growled. As much as he was convinced of Chroma's insanity, he knew the man was still brilliant, which was why Chroma's obsession with video games was a constant source of annoyance to the military general.

Chroma took a moment to sigh "Jimmy, when was the last big grimm attack caused from people worrying?"

Ironwood frowned, but answered all the same. "About Twenty or so years ago I believe," he said flatly.

Chroma nodded "Right, and how long has it been since Genmu corporation gained enough ground to take off so to speak?"

Ironwood's eyes narrowed when he realized what Chroma was getting at, but answered all the same. "Twenty years," he said begrudgingly.

Chroma grinned "You see what I'm getting at here right?"

Ozpin chuckled at the bickering, which was mostly Chroma doing his best to goad James into a reaction "I believe we do."

Chroma smirked at the Atlesian headmaster "Because of my video games, people have been spending less time worrying about the Grimm suddenly attacking. The games my company makes help to calm their minds, plus, some of my games do make people smarter. I mean, remember the world record for fastest 10 faced rubix cube solved? The kid who did it played a lot of my puzzle games," Chroma said with a smirk. "And as for my movies, well I dunno about you but I for one think kids need to grow up with some kind of dream outside either becoming a Huntsman and fighting to the death, or living inside the walls cowering from the Grimm. Maybe it's not real, but it's better than slapping them in the face with cold reality every turn of the way."

Ozpin nodded in agreement to the logic "Quite, some of my most recent graduates did say that some of your movies inspired them even."

"I'm guessing they were fans of the Marvel project then." Chroma muttered with a smile, before laughing. "Should I expect to see Iron Man flying across my window soon? Or Captain America throwing his shield at a grimm?"

Ironwood sighed slightly, as loathe he was to admit, the Marvel and DC Projects were some of the series Genmu Corp had created with actual value in his mind, what with the heroes that used technology that they MIGHT be able to adapt if not replicate (he even remembered the time he caught some of his students trying to build a lightsaber after they had watched Star Wars). "At any rate, my question still stands. Where did you find these 4 Rider candidates?"

"That… is none of your business, my riders, my information." Chroma said simply, putting the pause after the beginning to give the General false hope.

By now Ironwood was glaring daggers at the game designer, but Ozpin quickly defused the situation. "Gentlemen, I think that is quite enough," he said calmly. "I understand you two do not get along, but the situation required it for both of you to be here right now," he sighed.

"What situation? I thought you just wanted us to watch the news report with you and give me a chance to piss off the tin man." Chroma said blankly, with Ironwood grounding his teeth and taking a deep breath to not rise to the bait.

Ozpin sighed at that, but didn't comment on it. "No, Chroma. The reason why I called you here is because as we all know, your 4 new Riders have been completed. What we all would like to know now is...what next? I know you never do anything without a reason...most of the time...but this is most certainly NOT one of those times," Ozpin said sternly.

Chroma blinked "Oh, that's what you meant." he said simply, unfazed by a stern Ozpin, before grinning like a shark "Why, the obvious route of course." he said, before leaning into his camera.

"Get started on upgrades."

"Ah yes, I assume this has to do with that particular line you Riders always have. 'Level Up', I believe," Ozpin mused.

Chroma nodded "Currently they are at Level 2… so, it's time to get started on sending them to the Level 3 world and beyond."

* * *

Meanwhile, down in the corridors of Beacon, one team was walking through it, heading off towards the ships that lead into Vale.

"Oh gosh this is so cool! They're already acting like superheroes!" Ruby gushed after she finished watching the news report on her scroll.

"Well, at least they take their job seriously." Weiss said, nodding slightly, she had to admit, even she was impressed.

"Kinda cool we met them before they officially became super heroes though." Yang said with a grin as she drank a bit of water from a bottle she got from a vendor a minute ago.

"Though it was certainly unexpected." Blake said, looking up from her book from time to time to avoid walking into anything or anyone.

As Ruby kept on talking, she soon ended up walking into someone, making both her and the person stumble, and Ruby was quick to apologize "Sorry about that!"

The person ended up being Spring, who turned to look at Ruby "No pro… blem… Ruby? Is that you?" she asked, her eyes wide.

Ruby looked back at her confused, squinting her eyes "Um… who are you?"

Spring frowned for a moment, before looking at herself "Right, I guess I did change style since we last saw each other." she muttered, before looking back up and smiling "It's me! Spring!"

Both Ruby and Yang's eyes went wide at that "Spring?!" Ruby said in shock, before she smiled, and suddenly hugged the taller and older girl "It's so good to see you again!"

Yang quickly joined the hug "What have you been up to?"

Spring made a strangled noise "Girls… can't… breathe…" she wheezed out as the two sisters were hugging her rather tightly.

The two of them heard her, and promptly let go, causing her to fall to the ground. "Sorry…" the two of them apologized.

At the same time, Weiss and Blake were looking at the exchange. "Spring...where have I heard that name before…?" Weiss mused.

"Spring Prisma. Daughter of Chroma Prisma, with Chroma Prisma being better known as the CEO of Genmu Corporation, which as recently revealed, created the Kamen Riders," Blake said.

Weiss glanced at Blake "You like being an encyclopedia don't you?"

Blake shrugged, it was a hobby. "So...I didn't know you two knew the daughter of the CEO of Genmu Corporation," she said, without saying the obvious question.

"Hmm?" Yang turned to look at her partner and shrugged "Oh, we've known Spring since we were kids."

"We played lots of games together." Ruby added, with Spring nodding to confirm with a smile.

Weiss paused as she heard that, before speaking "How did that happen?" she asked in honest curiosity.

"Ruby and Yang were test players for some of dad's new games 7 or so years ago, we ended up meeting at the company building on 'Bring your child to work day'." Spring answered.

"Your company does that?" Blake asked, a bit surprised.

"Once every two months at least, we also make sure to keep kids away from the computers." Spring said as she remembered how they'd almost lost some data because of some hyperactive kids, had it not been for that particular worker's computer to have several backups because of the user being paranoid of losing everything… the man had promptly received a bonus at the end of the day.

"So Spring, what have you been up to? We haven't seen you in years," Yang asked.

"Really? You've never seen any Genmu Corporation advertisements in years?" Spring asked with a chuckle.

"Of course we have, but the only person we...always...see...no way!" Ruby said her eyes sparkling at the end.

Spring laughed a bit "Took you long enough."

"Hold on, seriously?" Yang asked, her eyes wide in surprise. "You're Poppy?"

"I play her role. I'm even the one who sings People Game," Spring said with a nod, it wasn't entirely accurate, but not a blatant lie either.

"So...what brings you to Beacon?" Weiss asked, making sure to sound polite. Her father's issues with Genmu Corp were no reasons to be impolite.

"Well, I came with dad since he needed to talk to Headmaster Ozpin about something. Probably to do with Natt and his team," Spring said.

"That makes sense. Your father's company DID make the Rider's armors," Blake nodded.

"Yeah, I was just taking care of a few things when I ran into you guys. I'm done now though," Spring nodded.

"Hey, if you're not busy, why not come with us? We were planning to out into the city for the weekend," Yang offered.

"That's a great idea! We haven't seen each other in so long we should hang out like we used to!" Ruby nodded in agreement.

"I don't see any problems with that," Weiss nodded. Over the last week she'd been keeping an eye on Ruby, and while the younger girl wasn't QUITE what Weiss had in mind when she thought of a team leader, she wasn't THAT bad either, so for now she decided she'd let things be...and give suggestions whenever she could think of any. And she had to admit, the sisters' cheerful personalities were contagious at times.

"It does sound rather fun," Blake admitted.

Spring grinned at that. "Sure. Just give me a minute," she said as she sent a message through her scroll, telling her dad about what she was going to do. She got a reply soon enough. 'Sure, have fun sweetie,' was what it said. "Okay, now dad knows where I'll be, so sure, let's go!" she grinned energetically.

* * *

"Vale is certainly bustling today," Spring said with a grin as they stepped out of the airship.

"Well, it's the weekend." Yang said with a shrug.

"So, did you all have anything in mind? I know plenty of places in Vale seeing as I live here and all that," Spring asked, idly looking at Genmu Corporation's Head Office which could be seen from where they were.

Ruby shrugged "Random shopping." she said simply.

Spring blinked, before shrugging as well.

With that, they started walking around Vale, hitting up random stores when they passed by them, and being surprised at some of them.

Like finding Edler and Natt in a Dust and Weapons shop, both of them stocking up on supplies.

Or finding Ai in a bike shop that Yang wanted to stop by.

They talked for a bit about possibly having a race between each other obviously.

And eventually, they reached an arcade, where, surprise surprise, Retsu was playing a game.

"We sure seem to be running into SBLE a lot today," Blake mused.

Taking a closer look, they found that Retsu was playing a shooter game, specifically House of The Dead: Overkill.

He was concentrating rather heavily, his hair on the orange side, as he calmly shot at every zombie that appeared on the screen.

Weiss made a face as she saw a zombie's head explode in a shower of blood and gore "How can anyone like that?"

"You kill zombies, it's good for stress relief… or for when you just want to blow something up." Yang said, her point emphasized by Retsu shooting at a barrel on screen and causing an explosion.

The girls looked at the boy who was clearly completely absorbed in the game. "...should we…?" Weiss started.

"No," Spring said. "Trust me, I've seen enough test players who get so engrossed in the game that they basically forget everything else. It's not worth it," she deadpanned.

An awkward silence descended on the girls. "So...who wants to play some games since we're here?" Ruby offered.

"I'm game,' Yang nodded.

"Sounds fun," Spring chuckled.

"I guess it could be fun," Blake mused.

Weiss seemed to mull the thought over for several moments "Well… is there anything that relies more on story than action? That might interest me… I think."

Spring immediately pointed towards a blue arcade cabinet. "Taddle Quest, right there. Thanks to the Save Card system Genmu Corp. introduced, its possible to play full on story RPGs despite being in an arcade," she explained.

Weiss looked at the arcade cabinet a bit, before slowly walking over to it and trying it out.

Ruby put on a thoughtful face as she thought about what to play, before spotting a magenta colored cabinet "Oh! Mighty Action X! Been awhile since I've played that." she said as she ran over to it, without her semblance thankfully.

"I think I'll go play Bakusou Bike… still no idea what the first word means though." Yang said as she walked towards the cabinet with a bike attached to it.

"It means Bursting." Spring called to her, receiving a nod from Yang who now realised that the name made sense.

Blake looked around at all the options, before looking at Spring "Anything you'd recommend?"

"Well… Bang Bang Shooting is still fairly new, so the company is accepting all criticism for it." Spring said as she pointed to the hefty navy blue colored machine with both a gun control and a floor pad for controlling the character.

A minute later, as Spring was beating her high score on Doremifa Beat, Dance pad version… again… for the 10th time… this month… she realized that the other four girls were playing the same games that empowered the four recent riders.

'I feel like there's a joke hidden here.' she thought to herself.

Eventually she finished her play again, her high score once again topped, a faint shout of "Oh come on!" from the next person who stepped up to it and saw the new score to beat.

As she walked back towards the girls, she looked at how they were doing.

Blake, Yang and Ruby were all done, and were all looking in surprise at where Weiss was playing… considering she was doing surprisingly well for a first timer. She'd actually found a number of hidden secrets and unlocked some of the better equipment early on.

"How are you this good?" Yang asked in surprise. Taddle Quest wasn't a so difficult that it had gamers banging their heads, but neither was it so easy that someone would be able to unlock so much so quickly.

"I… I honestly don't know… I suppose I'm just used to thorough examination." Weiss replied, surprised herself.

"...you should try some of Genmu Corp's puzzle games too," was all Spring could say. She had a feeling Weiss would finish those easily enough too.

"... maybe I will." Weiss mumbled with a nod, as she activated the save function and a memory card popped out of the arcade, stowing it away in her pouch for now.

Minutes later, the girls were once more walking around Vale, and ended up on an interesting sight.

Edler, sitting down at a cafe, and eating a slice of cake.

"Oh! Hey Edler!" Ruby said with a wave as they went towards him.

He looked up, greeting them with a nod as he had a piece in his mouth at the moment, waving them over at the same time.

As they sat down, he finished swallowing his bite. "Hello again girls."

"Finished getting Dust?" Yang asked to start up a conversation.

Edler nodded "Natt still had a few things to go check out, and I was starting to feel a bit hungry."

As everyone settled down to relax, they soon enough heard the sounds of someone collapsing, making them quickly turn to see a young man on the ground, with a young woman hovering over him worryingly.

And his body had glitches on it.

Seeing that, Edler immediately got up, pulling out his gamescope and quickly going towards the man, before crouching down near him and activating the scanning function, the virus showing up as a pink heart on the screen.

"That's Alhambra's strain." Spring said from over his shoulder, making him nod remembering the file on that Bugster. Alhambra is a Bugster from his game, Taddle Fantasy. Unlike Salty who was more physically oriented, Alhambra being a mage was focused more on magic, making him a potentially unpredictable opponent. With that in mind, he quickly pulled out his scroll.

"Everyone, I've found a patient. It's the Alhambra strain. I'll begin the operation immediately. Join me as soon as you can in the Castle Courtyard Stage," he said, before hanging up.

As he looked up to see how many people were around the area, he blinked in surprise as he saw the only ones left were himself, team RWBY, Spring, and the young woman who was still hovering worriedly over the patient.

"What just happened?" Edler said in confusion.

"Managed to get everyone away so you could get to work." Ruby said with a shrug.

"... I don't even want to know how." Edler said with a sigh before strapping on his Gamer Driver, and pulling out his Gashat. "Now then, let's begin the Operation."

" **TADDLE QUEST!"**

"Henshin," Edler said, before slotting the gashat in, and quickly transformed into Kamen Rider Brave Level 1. In response to that, the virus inside the man's body reacted, and Brave quickly pressed the stage select button.

" **Stage Select!"**

The pixels spread and the world shifted.

Once the pixels cleared around the world, Brave stood facing down what looked like a giant lantern on six legs in a large castle courtyard with a fountain in the middle.

Wordlessly, he summoned the Gashacon Sword to himself, holding the blade up before running in and darting between the Union's legs, slashing at them as precisely as he could.

Of course, the Union tried to retaliate, but Brave dodged out of the way from beneath its legs, with some effort on his part.

"This form really is not the most mobile." he muttered as he ran for one of the chests in the courtyard, intent on giving himself an advantage.

Kicking it open with his foot, an energy item flew out, purple in color, and showing a rider with X in it's eyes and question marks around it's head, with Brave nodding slightly as he used the flat of his blade and knocked it towards the Union.

" **CONFUSE!"**

As the effect of the item settled onto the Union, it started to stumble around drunkenly and even randomly bashing itself into a wall.

Brave couldn't help but stare as it did that "Well… that's definitely helpful." he said with a nod as he kept a safe distance and started using his semblance to slash at it.

Apparently that did the trick, as the slashes delivered by his semblance started cutting off his legs, causing the Union to tumble down, but, it wasn't out of the fight just yet, as it shifted to form a kind of castle wall… and started hurling projectiles at Brave from afar.

Brave grit his teeth under the armor as he rolled out of the way, running and jumping to dodge the projectiles, something that was made difficult by 2 things. First of all, he was in the slower, less agile Level 1 form, and on top of that, he was using an RPG game. Dodging and high mobility was better suited for a Platformer or even an FPS. Speaking of which… "Dammit guys, where are you?" he growled slightly as he dodged another volley. Sure he was doing okay by himself, but a little help would be nice. Especially since he DID say he was using the Castle Courtyard Stage…

* * *

Truth be told, all of his teammates had quickly transformed and entered the stage when they got his message. Problem was….

Lazer blinked, as instead of a courtyard, he seemed to be in some kind of bedroom...and if the lavish, and somewhat feminine design was any indication, he was in the Princess's Bedroom.

At the same time Snipe felt his eye twitch a little. Honesty he could hear the sounds of battle. Problem: he was on the opposite side of a moat, with the castle walls too high for him to jump towards, and the drawbridge was currently up.

Likewise, Ex-Aid felt a huge sweat drop forming, as currently instead of a Castle Courtyard, he seemed to be in a Castle Dungeon...and for some reason he was behind bars too.

Eventually all three couldn't help but say the same thing. "WHAT THE HELL?!"

* * *

Chroma was busy working on some data for a new gashat, when his mouse accidentally clicked a wrong file, bringing it up. A list of 'to do'. "Hm…" he mused, looking at the list and noting a few things he hadn't gotten to doing. "Looks like the castle set still has that bug in it I never got to fixing," he muttered, before shrugging. "Oh well, I'll do that later. I mean, what are the odds the boys picked THAT stage of all the stages in their belt," he chuckled, completely oblivious to the fact that yes, the boys HAD indeed picked that stage with said bug acting up.

* * *

Brave managed to barely dodge out of the way of another projectile "There has to be some way… wait a minute." he quickly glanced at his shield, before looking at the wall readying another projectile "That might work." he muttered to himself, gripping his shield tightly and taking up a defensive posture "At least, I hope it will."

He waited as the projectile was finished, watching it get launched and sail through the air towards him, quickly falling back down.

And then he used his shield to punch it back.

Well, punching it back would be a crude way of putting it, he had actually swung his shield with perfect timing at the projectile, sending it flying back at the wall.

'Thank you Legend of Zelda.' he thought to himself as he saw the projectile collide with the wall and send it crashing down.

Once he was sure it was stunned, he ran at another chest, opening it, and finding a Muscular item, which quickly flew into him " **MUSCULAR!"** making him arms buff up for a moment, before he turned to the still recovering Union, running at it and raising his sword high as he jumped up and brought it down in an overhead slash.

The attack did the trick, as the Union burst before starting to reform into it's true bugster form. Not wasting any time, he immediately went for the lever. "Skill level 2," he said as he pulled it open.

" **GATCHAN! LEVEL UP! TADDLE QUEST!"**

The screen appeared and he quickly went through, the Level 1 armor bursting off to reveal his level 2 form. Inwardly he was glad Chroma had told them of the 'skip cutscene' function, cause as amusing as the level up jingles were, there was no doubt in his mind that they'd get old...fast.

Just as he finished transforming, the Bugsters also finished forming, this time it was a group of Grunts dressed in robes and/or armor like classic RPG characters, and leading them was a red mage-like Bugster, one he recognized as Alhambra.

"Ah, I see my creature has been defeated, you surprise me to be honest, however, can you deal with this?" Alhambra said grandly as he turned to Brave, holding his staff up high "Copy!"

As he brought it down, several magic seals appeared in his group of bugsters, generating copies of him… several of them in fact.

"Can you find the real one, oh foolish knight?" all of the Alhambra spoke in unison.

Brave clicked his teeth in annoyance as he looked at the assembled group of bugsters, raising his sword up and shifting it to Ice Mode, raising his free hand up, and making a 'come here' gesture.

The bugster took the taunt as it was, and charged forth, the multiple Alhambra's walking forth at a more sedate pace.

Brave didn't waste time, as he made use of his semblance to begin attacking them before they even reached him, managing to catch most of them off guard, including one of the Alhambra copies which dispersed.

As he got to getting rid of the lesser bugsters, he made sure to keep an eye on Alhambra, to be ready to react to any other spell that might be cast.

Suddenly, he heard one of them shout "Flame!" making him jump away from the group of bugsters, resulting in them being caught in the fire that sprang suddenly to life.

"Uh… that wasn't supposed to happen." the Alhambra who fired the spell said sheepishly.

Brave didn't waste time after that, running up to him while he was still embarassed from his mistake and dispelling him.

That set the others off as they started firing other spells at him "Freeze!" "Spark!" "Tornado!" "Quake!" and he rolled out of the way of the four spells that ended up clashing against each other and backfiring, destroying the copies that had launched them.

"Thank God for stupid clones," Brave couldn't help but chuckle.

The real Alhambra grumbled something under his breath, before coughing "No matter! You must be tired out now from all that running around, so, I shall end you with my strongest spell! Ru-"

"You talk too much." Brave said simply as he cut Alhambra on the front.

… only to be surprised as he dispersed like the clones.

"What?! What just-?" he muttered in confusion as he looked around "He actually tricked me… I… I didn't expect that."

He sighed as he looked around to make sure his enemy wasn't just hiding, before untransforming and coming out of the stage, appearing at the same place he was, except no one was around now "Right, I suppose they moved him to the CR." he muttered to himself as he set off towards the hospital. Right as he was about to reach the hospital, he met up with his teammates who were also on the way to the hospital. "Where were you guys?" Edler asked as they ran.

"Hey, don't look at us. We TRIED to get into the area, but when I picked the Courtyard, I ended up inside the castle, in the princess' room," Ai said.

"You too? I ended up outside of the castle wall," Natt frowned.

"I ended up in the dungeon," Retsu added. Hearing that, everyone frowned wondering what had happened...but ultimately they came to the same conclusion. "Chroma!" they all growled, seeing as if anyone would know why their equipment went on the fritz...it was the maker.

Meanwhile, Chroma felt like someone was angry with him for some reason as he entered the CR to have a look at the current patient's file, blinking as he saw the patient's name "Azure Stone… huh, that's pretty surprising." he muttered, he then noticed a footnote saying the young woman who came in with him was his fiancee, Samantha Waves "... I feel like there's a joke hidden here for some reason." Chroma muttered with a raised eyebrow, but quickly shook it off.

He eventually looked up as the boys walked in, though for a reason he didn't understand, they all shot him a quick glare, with Ai staying behind and holding up the glare.

Chroma just stared at him with a raised eyebrow "What?"

"What the hell is wrong with the Castle Courtyard stage?" Ai asked simply.

Chroma blinked, before groaning as he facepalmed "Oum dammit you actually DID choose that one." he sighed as he looked back at Ai "The stage has a bug in its coding, it has issues spawning people where they actually want to go."

"And you didn't fix it because…?" Ai asked with a deadpan expression, having a good feeling he knew why.

"I was going to get around to it but I kept forgetting to do it." Chroma said with a just a touch of embarrassment in his tone.

"Of course you did," Ai groaned before going to the CR's operating room.

Inside the room, the four boys were currently talking to the patient and his fiancee to try and get any details from them.

"So, is there anything that's stressing you out lately?" Natt asked them as he checked to make sure the virus strain hadn't worsened yet.

The couple looked between each other at that "Well…" Azure started, before turning to the boys "To be honest, I'm worried about how our wedding will go."

"Understandable, it's a big change for the two of you." Edler said with a nod.

"Kinda reminds me about what mom said about her and dad's wedding, apparently she got so nervous she started hyperventilating while putting on her dress." Retsu said with a chuckle, which seemed to help calm Azure and Samantha as they smiled in amusement at the thought.

"So, we're going to go hunting down the bugster pretty soon, and it would probably be best if you stayed here miss, since it'll be looking to cause stress to the patient, and chances are it'll do that by trying to hurt you." Ai said as he looked at the news feed on his scroll for any possible locations that Alhambra had been spotted at.

Samantha nodded in understanding "Of course, I wouldn't want me being hurt to make it worse for Azure." she said with a smile, which Azure returned.

"We thank you for your cooperation," Edler said with a smile, while a bit further back, Retsu whispered to Natt.

"Glad these two have common sense," Retsu whispered, to which Natt couldn't help but nod.

With that said, and nothing else left to discuss, the team set out from the CR to start looking for Alhambra, taking on their Level 2 forms midway through leaving the building.

As they came up to the exit, Ex-Aid had opened up a line to speak with Spring "We're heading to hunt down Alhambra, any suggestions as to where he might be?"

Spring nodded as she started checking something "I think… the venue of the wedding would be good, though, there's two churches in Vale, and they apparently still haven't decided which one to use."

"We'll split up then, same partner as in the initiation." Snipe said as the other nodded, Brave following after him while Ex-Aid and Lazer went off in another direction.

As Snipe and Brave started to near the church they had chosen to head for, they could hear some noise coming from inside it at a distance, slowing down near it and crouching at one of the windows as they listened in.

"Alright you moronic fools! Destroy this place! After that we'll head for the other one and trash it as well! Then we just need to find that damn woman, and I'll be complete!" the voice of Alhambra spoke as they could hear what they assumed where grunt bugsters trashing the inside of the church.

"Think Remnant has a god?" Snipe asked lowly.

"If it does, he's probably pissed off right now." Brave said in amusement as they went to the door.

"Heh, well then, care to play god's emissary on their asses?" Snipe couldn't help but chuckle.

"That's definitely promising." Brave shot back as both he and Snipe looked at the door before kicking it open, sending a few of the bugsters flying into the far wall.

 **(Play Crossing Field by LiSA)**

Alhambra turned to the door, scowl set on his face "So, the knight returns does he? Very well, since my clones are so incompetent, I'll deal with you personally! As for the other one… my minions shall handle him." he said as he waved his staff forwards, the grunt bugsters running at Snipe and forcing him to run back out of the church to get better chances at shooting them.

Brave made sure his partner could handle himself before concentrating on his own enemy "You realise clones won't work anymore, yes?"

"Yes, I believe I've realised that." Alhambra muttered, looking very much cross right now.

With that said, Brave switched his sword into Fire mode, and waited for Alhambra to make the first move.

Apparently the mage was stupid enough to do so "Witness my glorious power!" he shouted as he raised his staff up and began channeling power into it.

Obviously, Brave attacked him right then and there, running up to him and slashing at his chest, making Alhambra stumble back as he was left with a burning cut on his body.

He growled as he righted himself "You… meddlesome… peon!" he roared in anger as he ran at Brave and tried swinging his staff at him, with Brave bringing up his sword in time to block.

He was, however, quickly surprised by a message in his visor's HUD.

 **[SKILL GAUGE FILLED/REQUIREMENTS FULFILLED/NEW ELEMENT UNLOCKED]**

The message made him blink in confusion as it flashed across his screen "New element?" he muttered, before eyeing the button on his blade which made it flip, and quickly pressed it.

With a sound of crackling electricity, his blade spun on itself, taking on a neon green/yellow color and sparks dancing across.

The change of his blade was surprising enough, and then it had the added bonus of sending sparks across Alhambra's staff and shocking him as he fell back while twitching a few times.

Brave looked more closely at his blade for a moment, before looking at the still stunned Alhambra, who was trying to get back control of his body "Well… best not to look a gift horse in the mouth."

He pulled out the Taddle Quest gashat from his belt, inserting it into the slot inside the Gashacon Sword " **KIMEWAZA!"** and watching as energy began to build on the blade, more concentrated than the last time he'd done it.

He turned his head to look back at his opponent, before holding his sword steady as he walked towards him.

" **TADDLE CRITICAL FINISH!"**

With the energy at it's peak, he slash Alhambra twice across the chest, discharging the electricity and energy into his body, causing his opponent to twitch a few times before his body blew up and eroded away into pixels.

 **(End music)**

" **GAME CLEAR!"**

He turned his head at that, seeing that apparently, Snipe had let him handle the last few moments of that fight.

"Good job, now let's call the others and head on back to the CR." he said as Brave nodded in agreement and the two made their way back towards the CR.

Meanwhile, not far from the church, Graphite watched the two riders walking away in distaste.

"You may have stopped this one… but you won't stop them all. I swear, I will make you all fall."

* * *

"Thank you for taking care of him." Samantha said as she let Azure lean on her as they were leaving the CR.

"Well, at least with one of the venues sacked, we know where we're going to have our wedding now, so I suppose one good thing came out of this." Azure said with a laugh as he used his fiancee for support until he stopped feeling dizzy.

"It's a good thing you two are safe as well." Retsu said with an easy smile as placed his hands in his pockets, his hair on orange.

"Hopefully the next time you two come to the hospital, it's for more pleasant news." Edler said as he shook both of their hands.

"And we all know what the only kind of pleasant news you get at a hospital is." Ai said with a grin, with the couple catching on and blushing a bit as they glanced at each other with smiles.

"And if you ever find you need help for anything, don't hesitate to come find us, we'd be glad to help." Natt added with a nod.

The two gave grateful nods as they soon left, and the boys went up into the main room, depositing their coats, before heading back out.

It felt good to help others out.

* * *

 **And there we go!**

 **So, yeah, my extra thing is that the riders will be getting slight power ups as you can see, starting with Brave getting a new element in his sword.**

 **Other power ups will be given to the others as well, don't worry.**


	11. Level 6

**Hey guys and welcome back to Gamer Hunters, where it's time for the next chapter!**

 **GAME START!**

* * *

"Are you actually trying to hit me, or do you just like looking like an idiot with that thing?" came the amused voice of Natt Jeger as he easily avoided another strike from his opponent. It was currently combat class, and for today's one on one battles, Natt had been picked with the random draw revealing his opponent to be one Cardin Winchester...and he still seemed pissed at them for the other day.

"Stand still so I can hit you dammit!" Cardin shouted through his teeth as one could practically see the vein ready to pop on his forehead.

Natt just gave him a dull look. "If you actually think someone would do that, then you're dumber than you look."

Cardin was practically foaming at the mouth from that comment and went for a blind charge at the gunner, but by now Natt had just about enough of this sad excuse of an opponent. He'd seriously hunted boars with more strategy than Cardin. With that in mind, he activated his semblance, time seemingly slowing down for him as crosshairs appeared on his eyes, before he aimed his gun...and opened fire.

Cardin didn't know what hit him, as he suddenly felt several bullets impact his arms, legs, torso...practically his entire body really. The bullets were all stopped by his aura, but that had the intended effect as he was blown back, his aura dropping into the red.

"You are a sad, sad man." Natt said, shaking his head with a sigh.

"Well now, it seems obvious that Mr. Winchester still needs to work on his anger management issues if he is to win without brute force." Glynda said, shaking her head in disappointment at the boy who had lost, before turning to Natt. "As for you, while your strategy had some merit, sometimes getting an opponent angry is a worse idea than letting them remain calm, as they might pull something incredibly drastic."

"Understood," Natt nodded. "I just didn't need to worry about that with this guy," he added under his breath, though the slight tugging on Glynda's lip implied she'd heard him...and was slightly amused.

As he walked back, he stopped to look at the roulette as it spun again, soon seeing it stop on the next two opponents.

"This should be interesting." he muttered, as the next match was Edler VS Jaune.

As he sat back down, Edler and Jaune stepped onto the arena.

"Placing my money on Edler." Ai said out of the blue.

"No bet," Retsu deadpanned, hood drawn up and covering his hair.

"You're no fun." Ai mumbled with a frown at that, while Retsu simply smirked.

"That's not very kind of you two." Pyrrha said with a frown at them.

"Honestly, it's because Edler has a bit of a secret weapon that we're certain Jaune doesn't know about." Retsu said with a shrug.

"What kind of secret weapon?" Yang asked as she turned around with a raised eyebrow.

"Just wait and see, we don't want to spoil you." Ai said, winking at her with a grin, which she returned.

Down in the arena, Glynda stepped off the ring as the match started, the two boys holding up their weapons.

Jaune looked a bit uncertain though, as he kept mentally repeating to himself that he could do this.

As for Edler, he was mostly just reminding himself not to transform, because then that would just be overkill.

After a few moments, Jaune raised his shield up, mostly to adjust his grip on it, and when he felt something impact it and push him back slightly.

He looked at his shield for a moment, before looking in confusion at Edler, who has only swung his sword without activating the dust in it "What was that?" he asked loud enough, without shouting, even though he felt like doing so.

Edler's lips twitched in amusement at Jaune's face "That would be my semblance, Precision Cut."

Back with the rest of the teams, they were all looking surprised, save for Edler's teammates of course, before Natt stepped in to explain.

"Edler's semblance basically lets him cut whatever he wants to, without having to touch it, as long as it's inside his range." he explained casually, the others teams nodding along.

"That seems a bit overpowered." Yang said as she looked back towards the arena.

"It fits him though." Retsu said with a shrug.

As Jaune processed what Edler had told him, which was basically the same thing Natt had told the two teams, he felt another slash hit him, this time right on his chestplate.

"It's good to be on the defensive Jaune, I can tell you that, but it doesn't always work with me." Edler said matter of factly as he held up his sword in front of himself.

Jaune let out a small nervous laugh at that, before breathing deeply and charging in, his sword being met with Edler's own.

"Again, good idea, getting up close and personal means it's harder for me to use my semblance." Edler said with a nod of approval.

Jaune wasn't sure how to take the words, but deciding to go with how Edler did mean them, helpful, and nodded at the advice.

Edler did give Jaune a bit of a fighting chance as well, wanting to see how good he was.

Honestly, the blonde could use a lot of work, something Edler decided to subtly address by giving his opponent a few tips as they fought.

Thankfully no one could hear them, so nobody was realising that Jaune was being helped in the middle of the fight.

Well, no one except for Blake, who rose a curious eyebrow before shrugging lightly.

Eventually, Edler pushed Jaune out of the ring, stopping the match.

"Well, that certainly was a long fight." Glynda started as she walked closer to the two boys "Mr. Arc, I'd recommend practicing your ability at avoiding attacks, while guarding is good, as Mr. Ritter told you, it doesn't work against everyone. As for you Mr. Ritter, try not to drag out your fights too much next time, as it might give your opponent time to come up with a counter strategy."

The two nodded at the words, before the bell rang, signalling the end of class.

As the teams walked off, having a few hours before their next class, they eventually split off, heading to do their own things.

Afterwards, Team SBLE made their way down to the CR, having had a conversation earlier with Spring about training and being told about the VR set, which they made use of to test out new ideas without risk.

After they felt they had tested out their tactics enough, they went back to wandering around Beacon, eventually coming up on a scene which ticked them off.

It was of Team CRDL, bullying another student, a faunus girl with long brown hair and rabbit ears.

"Please stop." she whimpered as Cardin was pulling on her ears.

However, to her surprise, it did in fact stop a second later, making her look towards her attackers, only for her eyes to widen.

All four of them on the ground, with a member of team SBLE hovering over them menacingly… and Natt had his weapon out and pointed at Cardin's… privates.

"Normally I'd just kick your ass and be done with it, but this little incident was going a bit too far, as for just why, well, did you know that a rabbit's ears are sensitive enough that pulling on them too hard can be dangerous for the rabbit? I know she's a faunus, but I'm positive it's a trait that was passed over." he said, never moving his gun as he looked to the girl, realising he wanted confirmation as she nodded, telling him that was indeed the case.

"Right, then you are definitely an idiot Cardin." Natt said as he turned back to the taller boy who was too afraid of the gun to move. Sure his aura could protect him...but a shot to the privates...even he wasn't dumb enough to risk that.

"What do we do with them?" Retsu asked as he stood over Russel, and the fear factor was ramped up by the darkness of his hood.

"Knock em out, leave a note that details what happened, the teachers will find them eventually." Natt said, and the others nodded as they made the members of team CRDL pass out in their own ways, as for Natt, he simply pressed his gun closer to Cardin's crotch, and that was enough to make the idiot pass out from fear of losing what made him a man.

"Anyone else wonder how these morons even got into this school?" Ai couldn't help but ask.

"My guess is that the headmaster was scraping the bottom of the barrel when choosing them." Edler said with a scoff.

Retsu chuckled before turning to the girl, who jumped a bit as the attention was on her "Are you ok?"

She looked at them for a few moments before nodding "Y-yeah. Thanks for that, they kind of ended up cornering me without the rest of my team since they all had something pretty important to handle before we met back up at our dorm."

"Sounds like Cardin's style, attacking someone when they're alone." Natt said with a low growl as he eyed the unconscious boy.

"What's your name miss?" Ai asked as he idly kicked Dove in the leg.

She looked at him do so with a raised eyebrow before his question registered "Velvet… Velvet Scarlatina."

"Would you like us to walk you to your dorm room Velvet?" Edler asked her.

She shook her head after a few moments, smiling a bit as she started to feel somewhat comfortable "No, I think I'll be ok since they're knocked out."

"If you're sure then, have a good day Velvet." Natt said with a smile as he nodded at her.

She smiled a bit more, nodding at them in thanks "You as well." she said before walking away back to her dorm room.

After she left, Retsu looked at the unconscious idiots on the ground, before looking at his teammates "Can we embarrass them?"

"Depends on what you had in mind?" Natt urged Retsu on, receiving a grin from beneath the hood.

Moments later, team SBLE was walking away from the scene, with Retsu grinning underneath his hood, while his teammates looked on in amazement as he'd somehow been able to stretch out team CRDL's underwear to make a super wedgie and cover their heads with it.

Eventually, the boys neared the dorm rooms, and they started to hear a conversation coming from one of them.

"Please stop Coco I'm tired." they heard Velvet's voice say from behind the door.

"Oh come on, I'm almost done with this bit, I'll let you sit down after." replied another voice, whom they assumed was Coco.

"Should we check?" Ai asked as he looked at the others.

"May as well." Retsu said with a shrug as he went up and knocked on the door, waiting a moment before they all heard footsteps come towards the door, with it being opened a second later.

Standing in the doorway was a girl with brown hair, a single streak of orange like color falling next to her face, her eyes covered by sunglasses and a beret on top of her head. As for her outfit as a whole, well, it was fashionable, that was probably the simplest way of putting it.

"Yes?" she said with a raised eyebrow.

"Coco, those are the ones I told you about earlier, the ones who helped me." Velvet called from further in the room, her head peeking out from behind a curtain set up in a corner.

Coco made an 'Ah' of understanding "So that's you guys then huh? Thanks for helping Velvet then, I think we're going to double our efforts to always have one of us with her."

"I'm not defenseless Coco!" Velvet shouted back, blushing a bit in embarrassment.

"Maybe not, but you have serious issues with standing up for yourself." Coco shot back dryly, making Velvet pout and look away as she didn't have a counter to that one.

"Well…" Natt started, trying to fight back a smile at the byplay "We were glad to help, we just couldn't let those jerks hurt her while doing nothing."

"Well, again, thanks for that, it's nice to know other students are decent human beings… or faunus if one of you just has a very hard to notice trait." she added with a raised eyebrow, eyeing Retsu, who shook his head, making her shrug.

With that said, the boys started walking away as Coco turned back to her room, only for the boys to stop as they heard Coco speak in a worried tone a few moments later "Velvet, what's this?" they heard, making them stop and moving back, their curiosity getting the better of them.

"Something wrong?" Natt asked as he poked his head back in the room.

He could see Coco looking at Velvet's shoulder, which, if you looked closely, there was barely noticeable bruise there, visible at the moment as Velvet seemed to have been modelling a dress for Coco.

Velvet was silent for a few moments before speaking softly "It happened a bit before they helped me, those other boys kinda shoved me around roughly and I hurt my shoulder against the wall."

Natt scowled lightly as he realised Cardin may deserve worse than the super wedgie Retsu had given him, before everyone's attention shifted to Coco as she suddenly bent over in pain, and the boys saw the telltale sign of a bugster infection.

"Edler!" Natt called simply in emergency, the young doctor running into the room and quickly looking Coco over with the gamescope, finding an image that looked like a moving bullet "That's Revol's strain."

"Right, someone call Spring." Natt ordered his team.

"Already taken care of." Ai said simply, putting away his scroll.

"Revol's a tactical opponent, so we'll need to play this fight smart." Retsu said helpfully.

"Right, we just have to wait for Spring to get here so we can move her to the CR." Natt said with a nod.

"Let me come with you." Velvet requested, the boys seeing she looked even more serious then they thought was possible for her.

"You won't really be allowed into the operation room so easily." Ai told her placatingly.

"Then I'll be in the waiting room, but I'm not leaving Coco alone." she added, fully determined to follow them.

The boys looked between each other at that, before nodding "Alright, you can come with us then." Natt told her.

Velvet nodded at that, smiling slightly.

A minute later, Spring arrived, pulling a gurney along with her, looking at Coco for a moment before looking at Retsu and Ai "Get her on and let's go."

The two nodded and carefully lifted Coco up, before depositing her on the gurney and pushing it towards the elevator.

Everyone else followed after them, Spring allowing Velvet to stay in the waiting area while they extracted the virus from Coco's body.

When the boys were ready, they stood in the operating room, with Coco lying down on the bed.

"This feels really weird." she said with a groan as she rubbed her forehead.

"We've been told that the symptoms culminate into a rather bizarre feeling most of the time, but don't worry, it'll pass once the virus is eliminated." Edler assured her, making her nod.

At that, the boys strapped their drivers on, quickly activating their gashats "Henshin." and transforming into they're Level 1 forms.

That alone was enough to agitate the virus as Coco winced and curled up on herself in pain while the virus started to form up.

"Let's go somewhere else." Natt said as he pushed down the button the slot holder " **STAGE SELECT!"** causing the selection wheel to appear before stopping and changing the area around them.

Once the change settled, the area around them was turned into what could be best described as a military training ground.

As for the Bugster Union, it quickly finished forming, and it's forms produced a few raised eyebrows.

It was, literally, a gun. Specifically, a revolver of some sort.

"This is pretty much the most obvious way of saying he's supposed to be my enemy." Snipe muttered with a shake of his head.

"Gotta admit, that's telling a lot yeah." Ex-Aid agreed with a nod.

The bugster somehow seemed ticked off at being called obvious, as it started firing at them, making the riders roll into cover.

"Alright, so it seems to have infinite ammo." Brave muttered as it kept firing without pause.

"Gotta hate that in enemies." Lazer said with a groan.

"At least you and Snipe can attack him." Ex-Aid muttered in annoyance as both Snipe and Lazer looked at him before turning to each other, nodding silently as they rose out of cover for a moment to start firing at the bugster.

Ex-Aid and Brave looked to each other as well, before moving over to separate bits of cover, Ex-Aid picking up a stone at his feet, quickly rising out of cover and throwing it at the bugster "Over here ugly!"

When the irritated bugster turned to him to fire, Ex-Aid smirked behind his helmet as his body flashed brightly for a second, the bullets hitting his body… and bouncing off, for his body was currently covered in a sheet of metal… and the Metal Mario tune from Super Mario 64 could be heard.

He started running around as soon as the power-up started, making sure to keep the bugster's attention on him, with Brave sneakily throwing different things he picked up at it, ducking back down, his job mostly being to just piss it off more.

In all honesty, it was something easy to do, since it kept getting fired at, insulted by Ex-Aid who kept picking up Metallize power ups along with reactivating his own Metal power up whenever he could, and with how it couldn't find Brave, the gun shaped Bugster was understandably pissed off.

Apparently, it was pissed off enough that it decided to quickly break apart into smaller bugsters.

"Well, that's somewhat unexpected." Ex-Aid muttered as his power up wore off, and all four riders pulled their levers, changing into Level 2.

"Let's make this quick, we wouldn't want him to get… away… oh, great, he's smart." Snipe started, only to end with a sigh as he could see 4 Revols within the group of bugsters, with the grunts all being geared up like soldiers.

"Did you riders honestly expect me to not come prepared to this confrontation? I pride myself on being a military commander of the highest standing! And it will not do to walk into battle without a backup plan ready!" One of the Revols shouted, clanging his gun like arm to his chest a few times.

"Is he american or something?" Ex-Aid muttered after a few moments of silence.

The others just shrugged, honestly not sure.

"When in doubt… kick it's ass!" Lazer shouted as he shot at one of the bugsters, destroying it as an energy arrow pierced it's head.

"ATTACK!" one of the Revols roared as he shot into the sky to accentuate his words.

 **(Play Goya no Machiawase by Hello Sleepwalkers)**

"Hunt them all down!" Snipe shouted and shot at that one Revol with his Gashacon Magnum, making him stagger backwards as a sizable dent appeared in it's armor.

To say the battle was a chaotic mess would be putting it aptly, as the riders had to avoid a hail of bullets from the bugsters while fighting back, something easier said done as they still got hit a few times.

Though, Ex-Aid was dodging bullets the most, using his platforming abilities to rush and jump between the bugsters, ending up with them accidentally shooting each other as they tried to shoot him… even then he still got hit plenty enough though.

And even with his semblance Lazer was having trouble dodging every bullet shot his way.

Brave was doing his best to try and deflect the bullets, getting some lucky strikes as some of them bounced off the flat of his blade and onto another bugster.

As for Snipe, he was using his semblance, rapid firing at the 4 Revols, knowing one of them was real so if one went down, so too would the others.

Eventually, he hit managed to hit one right in the forehead, making it still before falling down on the ground, and blowing up.

Following that, the remaining three went up in smoke, just in time for the smaller bugsters to be defeated.

Snipe smirked underneath his mask "Mission complete."

Ex-Aid looked around, a bit confused "Something's missing." he muttered.

Brave looked at Ex-Aid, before nodding "I know what you mean… something's not right."

Snipe frowned as he listened to them, now he also had that nagging feeling in the back of his head.

Lazer looked up in thought, before he snapped his fingers "Ah! The Game Clear message! It didn't appear!"

The others all stilled at that, before Ex-Aid started on a swear rant (bleeped out for your consideration) and Snipe sighed in disappointment at the fact they'd forgotten that important factor.

"We need to find him as fast as we can." Brave said after a few moments.

"Yeah, problem is there's 3 of him, so it won't be easy to figure out which one is real, or even what his target is." Lazer said with a sigh.

"Let's start by going back to the CR, we'll come up with a plan there." Snipe said, the other two nodding, before they all turned to Ex-Aid who was panting, finally being done with his rant.

* * *

"Alright, we know that there's currently 3 Revols walking around town, hunting down whatever would stress Coco out, and even she's not fully sure just what he'd be going after. We need to split into teams to hunt him down." Spring said as she tapped an illustration she drew on the whiteboard, before placing stickers of the heads of the riders on it.

"Question is, who's going after who?" Natt muttered in thought.

"If you don't mind my input, I could help with that." Chroma said as he stepped into the room at the same time Natt spoke.

"Hey dad." Spring said with a small grin as she nodded at her father who smiled at her.

"Don't you have a company to be running?" Retsu asked, honestly confused by the man's presence right now.

Chroma merely grinned at the question.

* * *

"I swear to Oum dad I'm going to get you back so hard for this." Duo muttered as he sat in his father's office and was currently handling the work. Specifically the mountain of paperwork that had backed up.

* * *

They all stared at Chroma as he snickered to himself, before the boys turned to Spring awkwardly, who just shrugged, as confused as they were.

After a few moments, Chroma finally stopped, schooling his features "Right, considering the way Revol works, we'll split into three groups, though one of us is going to be solo. I suggest Natt go at it alone due to his choice of weapon reducing the amount of risk to him, as for our two teams…" Chroma trailed off as he walked towards the whiteboard, moving around the stickers, showing the Brave and Lazer stickers together, while a Genmu sticker was with the Ex-Aid one, and the Snipe sticker was alone.

Retsu looked askance at Chroma "So I'm going with you then?" he said, still not fully trusting the man.

Chroma merely smirked at him "Two mighties are better than one, wouldn't you agree?"

Retsu merely looked at him for a few moments before looking away.

Chroma chuckled a bit at the reaction until Spring slapped him on the arm "Don't tease him dad."

"Anyway, we should get going as soon as we can, we want to avoid having Revol cause our patient too much stress." Natt said, earning nods all around.

"By the way, when did Velvet leave?" Ai asked as he looked around, not seeing the faunus girl anywhere at the moment.

"About a minute before you all came back in, she said she had to go find her two other teammates and tell them what happened." Spring answered, with Ai nodding before they all went out to look for Revol.

* * *

Natt walked around Vale, his driver strapped to himself but hidden underneath his camo cloak for a fast Henshin.

"Anything yet?" he asked into his scroll, which was painted a navy blue with a neon green button.

"Nothing, that's what's concerning." Edler replied from his end.

"He's a sneaky bastard alright." Retsu added from his own end.

"What do we know about Coco that could help us figure out where those jerks are?" Ai grumbled out from his phone.

"According to the gossip from Beacon that Spring has overheard, she's known as the 'Queen of Fashion'." Chroma supplied helpfully from his line.

"So, a clothing store might be Revol's target then." Natt muttered with a nod.

"We'll look for the pricier ones in our area." Edler said before his and Ai's lines closed.

"We'll do the same here. Be careful boss." Retsu said from his line as he and Chroma signed off.

Natt sighed as he started looking for anything that might even remotely look like a clothing store.

He did find a few, but no sign of Revol at any of them, which was slowly starting to frustrate him.

After a whole hour of searching, he was about to call the others again when he heard an explosion nearby, with people running away from it.

"Finally." he muttered as he ran towards it, expecting to find Revol blowing up a store.

But he found something else.

Velvet, hiding behind a wall, using some kind of holographic sniper rifle to shoot at Revol.

Her effort was commendable, but Revol only seemed to find being shot at a nuissance.

Reaching into his cloak, he pulled out a little something he kept hidden in him.

Throwing it out, Velvet seemed to notice it, her eyes widening as she hid back behind the wall.

As for Revol, he only noticed at the last second, before being blinded by a powerful light and a loud bang.

Taking the chance, Natt ran towards the cover Velvet was using, hiding behind it just as Revol was starting to recover.

"What happened?" he asked as soon as he was hidden.

"He just came out of nowhere and started shooting at me, I don't even know why." Velvet said in a mildly panicked tone.

"Well… he's Coco's bugster, so chances are, attacking you is what would stress Coco out." Natt explained with a frown as he realised that Revol had been leading them on a wild goose chase.

Velvet frowned as he ears drooped slightly "That… that would make sense… Coco's like a big sister to me, even though we're the same age."

"Bastard." Natt muttered before grabbing his gashat from inside his cloak "Stay hidden, you won't be able to damage him."

She nodded in understanding as he stepped out of cover, pulling his cloak back enough to reveal his driver "Hey! Revol!"

Revol shook his head to clear the last bit of blindness from his sight, and scowled as he saw Natt "I should have known one of you damn riders would find me. But that's ok, the others are occupied, so you're all alone now."

Natt scoffed "You forgot one detail. The same thing applies to you." he said, pointing his Gashat at Revol, hitting the button to generate the game area before holding it above the slot in the driver "Henshin. Second tactic." inserting it and opening the lever in quick succession.

" **BANG BANG SHOOTING!"**

The screen passed over him, donning him in his Level 2 armor with his Gashacon Magnum already in hand.

Meanwhile, a similar situation was happening in two other portions of town.

" **TADDLE QUEST!"**

" **BAKUSOU BIKE!"**

Brave and Lazer brandished their weapons as they ran at the Revol they had found attacking a clothing store, a tactic to split their attention obviously, with Lazer using his sickles to hook onto his gun and pull it away, giving Brave an opening to attack his chest.

As for the other end of town.

" **MIGHTY, MIGHTY ACTION X!"**

" **MIGH~TY ACTIO~N X!"**

Genmu and Ex-Aid both jumped up high as they avoided the shots of the third Revol, falling down and stomping on him when he had to reload his weapon.

Back with Snipe, he rolled out of the way as Revol opened fire, ending up behind a tree as he peaked out and fired a shot wide to dissuade him from keeping up his fire.

"Right… gonna need a plan…" he muttered as he looked at the oil drums around the area, until he spotted one that was different, red instead of blue, and his years of playing shooters translated that into one thing "Explosive barrel… perfect, now I just need him to get close to it."

He kept firing at the bugster a few times to keep him in one spot while he thought of a plan, taking a few minutes before nodding to himself as he had one that might work.

Peeking out of his cover for a moment to make sure Revol was concentrating fully on him, before making a run for it, heading into an alleyway.

"Hey! We're not done here!" Revol shouted as he followed after Snipe, intent on not letting him escape.

Snipe smirked underneath his helmet as he shot at the bugster a few times while running around the area, taking every twist and turn he could while being sure Revol didn't lose him for too long.

Eventually Revol arrived at a dead end, where he saw Snipe facing away from him, his cloak covering his body completely, making him smirk "Well, well, well… it seems you've run out of places to hide you little rat." he raised his weapon to Snipe's helmet "Any last words?"

"Yeah, bad guys should really learn to look up." he heard Snipe's voice say, from, well, up, making him crane his neck upwards to see Snipe with his foot resting against a red barrel on top of the roof, his cloak discarded, before he kicked the barrel down, with Revol recognizing what it was a few seconds later.

But it was a few seconds too late.

Snipe merely lined up his weapon with the barrel "Bang." he muttered as he pulled the trigger the bullet travelling for a few feet before piercing the barrel.

An explosion rose up above from within the alley a moment later, Snipe covering his face with his arm as the light from the explosion blinded him for a second.

He knew it wasn't quite over yet though, having learned his lesson earlier, that until he hears the system announce a Game Clear, the fight was still on.

Once the smoke cleared, he saw Revol trying to limp away from the area, making him shake his head before taking out his gashat from his driver and inserted it into his weapon as it started to charge up energy while he lined up his shot, shifting it into sniper rifle mode at the same time.

" **BANG BANG CRITICAL FINISH!"**

Revol turned his head to look, instantly regretting it as he tried to get away faster, only for Snipe to pull the trigger, launching out a powerful bullet that tore through the bugster, causing him to explode.

" **GAME CLEAR!"**

Snipe sighed in relief at finally hearing the message, before blinking as he saw something on his HUD.

 **[SKILL GAUGE FILLED/REQUIREMENT FULFILLED/NEW AMMO UNLOCKED]**

"New ammo huh?" Snipe muttered as he looked around his HUD before finding an icon that showed the selected ammo, mentally choosing to cycle through it, and smirking at the icon of the new ammo type.

It was an explosion, meaning he'd just been granted explosive bullets.

"This is definitely going to be helpful." he muttered, before finally undoing his transformation.

* * *

"If any of you boys ever need help, you know where to find me, I owe you one after today." Coco said as she and Velvet were escorted back out of the CR by Spring.

"Well, it seems everything went well." Natt said with a smirk.

"Speak for yourself." Retsu muttered as he held an ice pack to his head.

"Again, I deeply apologize for what happened." Chroma told the still hooded teen, who merely waved him off with a mutter of "It was an accident."

"Freaking disappearing bugsters, making me crash into a window." Ai muttered before wincing as Edler continued to disinfect his cuts.

Natt looked away from them "Yeahp, everything's just fine." he said, before receiving a plastic glass to the head courtesy of Retsu who was glaring at him, which in turn caused the others to laugh at him in amusement as he rubbed the spot he was hit. Yeahp, just another day in this crazy team...and he wouldn't have it any other way.

* * *

 **And there!**

 **Sorry it took a while for me to post something else.**

 **Anyway, I hope you liked this chapter.**

 **See ya next time!**


	12. Level 7

**Welp, after nearly a year, this story is finally back!  
**

 **Sorry the return chapter is so short though, you'd be surprised at how hard it is to come up with material sometimes.**

 **However, I do promise that for the next little while, this story has my full attention.**

 **Anyway, expect a little surprise right at the start of this, one that some of you might have seen coming.**

 **Also, finally adding in the intro, because it was damn time we did that.**

 **The intro does use Magna Ryunoid's version as a basis since there were some good ideas, but we fixed up the grammar mistakes and Dreamer added his own touch to it.**

* * *

The screen is displayed with a little static as the music starts up, it was a digital sound as the words "Game Start" appeared

 _I gotta believe…_

In a digital field surrounded by static four male figures are seen as the scene shifts around them. The static appears as it approaches the four figures showing them now with armor but only three were human as the fourth appeared to be a motorcycle. Static appears as the faces of the four Riders known as Ex-Aid, Snipe, Brave and Lazer are seen, before the title "Gamer Hunters" appears.

 _I don't wanna know heta na shinjitsu nara_

Four Gashats colored magenta, cyan, navy blue and yellow respectively fly through the air in a spiral before being caught by four figures standing in a circle facing outward, before the image shifts to show the riders starting from Retsu as the "Mighty Action X" logo appears behind him, then Edler appears with the title of "Taddle Quest", Natt with the title of "Bang Bang Shooting" and Ai with the title "Bakusou Bike"

 _I don't wanna know shiranai kurai ga ii noni_

A girl looks up as she turns around to reveal Spring with an apprehensive expression on her face, while by her side a screen appears, with Poppy inside also turning to the screen and waving cheerfully.

 _Why? Why? Why? Why? kizukeba I came too far_

Spring raises her hand and the four riders disappear as the sky of Remnant rises with the broken moon high in the night. The scene then changes to show a shot of Team RWBY and Team JNPR, standing through an empty town with various worried expressions as the scene soon faded away.

 _Tomaranai kanjiru kono yokan wa_

The four riders walk as the scene is in black and white with humans and faunus walking normally before switching to a red sky with silhouettes of Grimm observing, before the scene is covered in the orange static of the Bugster Virus

 _The new beginning_

The scene changes to show the four riders looking forward with varying expressions, Retsu smiling at the screen, Edler looking stoic, Natt with a slight frown, and Ai with a confident smirk, followed by splashes of blue and pink static, ending with a shot of Chroma smiling proudly.

 _michi no ryouiki ima wo kirihirakun da_

The four riders activate their respective Gashats, triggering a game area signaled by a wave of colored pixels erupting from them with a variety of items in it. The scene then changes to show a shot of Team RWBY around a screen (Ruby leaning over the screen, Yang leaning on it, Weiss standing next to it and Blake sitting down against it) depicting the Riders in their various henshin poses, followed by a shot of Team JNPR sitting against another screen (this one depicting Poppy waving at the screen followed by a shot of Chroma smiling over his shoulder and turning into Genmu before walking away.

 _I gotta believe!_

Everything changes to a digital terrain as Retsu, Edler, Natt and Ai are transformed into their level 1 Rider Forms as three more mysterious figures stand in the arena.

 _(Turn it on!) Soutou_

The Gamer Driver's lever suddenly flips open, causing the faces of the Riders to shine.

 _EXCITE! EXCITE! takanaru_

 _EXCITE! EXCITE! kokoro ga_

Team SBLE starts to fight the Grimm with Snipe firing the Gashacon Magnum, Brave attacking with the Gashacon Sword in fire mode, followed by a stab to the ground in ice mode, followed by Ex-Aid riding on Lazer as he turned abruptly causing the sparks to hit the Grimm.

 _michibiku ano basho e kakenukete ikudake!_

Team RWBY and JNPR appear to join the fight, the stage changes to a raised hand in the top of the bright sky showing being Retsu and his friends lying on the ground contemplating the view. The scene changes to a nightscape as a mysterious figure is holding a Blue Gashat, seemingly looking at it in deep contemplation, before suddenly turning around and activating it, a game screen titled 'Perfect Puzzle' appearing behind them as a series of colored orbs and blocks are released with the game area as the scene is overcome by the blue pixels.

 _(Hey!) I'm on a mission right now_

 _(Hey!) I'm on a mission right now_

Once the pixels fade, the scene shows the four riders in fighting poses together with their friends. On the other side is a black background with green circuits as five silhouettes with armor stood in opposition of them, with one of them holding a black gashat

 _EXCITE! EXCITE! kotae wa..._  
 _EXCITE! EXCITE! kotae wa!_

Team SBLE, RWBY, and JNPR are standing on beacon academy as several holograms revolve around them depicting various fights involving them, before the scene starts changing quickly.

 _(One!) kono te no naka…_

Team RWBY appears, aiming their weapons

 _(Two!) ...susumu beki life…_

Team JNPR appears holding their weapons at the ready

 _(Three!) ...ikite iku dake!_

The title appears as team SBLE is in front as they point to the camera and everything becomes covered in static.

* * *

"Alright… what's the occasion you got the zodiac of the damned together this time Oz?" Chroma asked with a raised eyebrow, earning groans from two of the others on the conference call.

"Where do you come up with these idiotic names?" Ironwood asked while pinching the bridge of his nose.

"At least it's not as mad as the Ozluminati." the other, a man with greying hair, a beard, and though it wasn't visible, a lion tail, added with a sigh.

"Don't you mean bad?" Ozpin asked with an amused eyebrow.

"I know what I said Ozpin, don't correct me." the bearded man said dryly.

"Love you too Leo." Chroma said with a snicker.

"Can we please just begin the meeting?" Ironwood sighed in aggravation at Chroma's antics.

"Quite." Ozpin said in amusement before looking to Leo "Anything new?"

"She's still none the wiser that I'm actually against her. However, her… protege I guess you could call her, the false maiden, she requested some fake verification placing her and some of her allies as Haven students, no doubt as a precaution for the Vytal Festival." Leo relayed.

"Sneaky of them, give em the papers anyway though, I may have an idea, besides, you can't be accused, you're sending them walking right into a trap." Chroma suggested.

"And this idea would be?" Ironwood asked with narrowed eyes.

"Not a secret project for once. See, I'm thinking they'll want to cause trouble for us, so instead, let's bring them in, keep a close eye on them, and when they least expect it… BAM! The jaws snap down on them!" Chroma said with a grin.

"Interesting idea. And what exactly would this trap be?" Ozpin mused.

"A virus. It's likely they'll try to hack us while they infiltrate the school grounds, so we use that against them and leave a virus in the systems for them, it'll latch onto whatever they use, and make it harmless, while giving us whatever information we need." Chroma explained.

"The idea… does have merit." Ironwood muttered, before looking at Chroma "When can you have it ready?"

"Two weeks tops. And yes, this is one you're allowed to use in your own systems, Oum knows you need the upgrade to your firewalls after all." Chroma answered preemptively.

Ironwood grumbled a little in annoyance at how easily Chroma had read him, but nodded. "Alright, we'll leave this one to you. If there's one thing you can be counted on it's your programming and innovations."

"Why thank you, I aim to please," Chroma chuckled, before his grin became almost savage. "Just leave it to me. I'll cook up something so out of the left field they won't even know what happened before it's too late."

"...and now I wonder how I ever was afraid of her when we have the real monster right here…" Leo sweat dropped.

"I'm glad he was able to convince you then." Ozpin said with a chuckle "Now then, considering the new information you've gotten for us recently Leo, I decided to call back someone."

"Please don't tell me it's who I think it is." Ironwood almost pleaded.

"Huh… been a while since I saw that dusty old crow." Chroma said with a smirk.

* * *

The classroom was full of murmurs seeing as this particular class was something of a last minute addition to their curriculum. In fact, the teacher wasn't even known at this point. As such, everyone was quite curious as to who it was...until the person stepped into the room.

"Alright you brats settle down. Class is in session." came the voice of a middle aged man, and there seemed to be a slight slur in it.

Edler and Weiss both looked at the man, and spoke in near unison "Are you drunk?" they asked with matching expressions of shock, though Weiss had a bit of disgust in hers.

"I'm always drunk." the man answered as he went up to the front of the classroom… until a red blur jumped him and clung onto him.

"Hi Uncle Qrow!" Ruby shouted happily as she clung onto the man.

There was… a long pause in the class as her words settled, while the man patted her on the head with a smirk.

"Wait… he's Ruby's uncle?" Retsu said in surprise.

"I swear I've seen someone with his eyes before too." Natt muttered, thinking back to his year exploring Remnant.

"Well...this should be an interesting class then," Ai chuckled.

"Are they sure he should be teaching us about weapons and maintenance?" Blake seemed skeptical...and a little worried, seeing as well...the idea of a drunk man handling live weapons...scary thought.

"I'm sure Ozpin wouldn't have employed him if he wasn't absolutely sure that this would work out...right?" Pyrrha seemed a little unsure.

"Eh, don't worry about it, Uncle Qrow may be a drunk, but he's dependable." Yang waved off.

"You'll excuse us if we don't exactly take your word for it." Ren commented unsurely.

"So… would you say he's your Drunkle Qrow?" Ai suddenly said to Yang with a grin.

Yang blinked at him for a moment, before returning the grin and pointing her fingers at him "Nice."

Meanwhile everyone around them, which was both their teams and team JNPR groaned at the horrible pun.

The class soon started and it was...actually pretty okay. True enough despite being drunk off his ass, Qrow knew his way around weapons. Though there was that one incident with a close call on a fire dust crystal, but...eh, nothing serious.

"Alright, now, let me see the weapons you brats all made for yourselves." Qrow said as he started going around the class and inspecting every weapon there, with some notable comments for a few.

"Ok, I can tell this is old, so it's obvious you inherited it, might want to see if you can't try to modify it with something new though, even just hiding a gun in the pommel might be a game changer." he had said to Jaune, who took that in and nodded, finding it to be a reasonable addition.

"Ok, I get where you're going with this, but this is WAY too easy to destabilise, try to come up with a better design." he said to Cardin, who grumbled but didn't retort.

"Huh… about time someone made a gun-gun, might want to add something in here though, maybe a hidden axe head in the butt of the rifle mode or something like that." was what he said to Natt.

Then he came up to Retsu and raised an eyebrow at the cylinder "So… did you make a lightsaber like in those movies?" he asked curiously.

"Actually, it's something that Mr. Prisma said was perfect for me and told me how to make it… not that he explained why." Retsu said, wearing his hood and holding up the cylinder, as the hammer came out of it, before switching out to the sword a second later.

Qrow hummed at that "Mind if I take a look?"

"Knock yourself out." Retsu said and held it out to the man who picked it up, looking it over, before holding it out… and a long black scythe blade came out.

There were quite a few gaping students at that.

Qrow narrowed his eyes at the scythe, before deactivating it and handing it back to Retsu, who was looking at his weapon curiously.

"Yeah… I think Chroma was onto something alright." Qrow said, looking at Retsu curiously, before nodding "Make sure you change out the crystal inside every year, they last a while, but DO need a replacement eventually."

"Right. I'll keep that in mind," Retsu nodded as he took back his weapon.

"Alright…" Qrow looked around slowly, before the bell rang "Welp, that's the class, same time next week, where we'll be looking into special ammunition, and yes, even the ones who don't have guns should pay attention, you might learn a thing or two."

* * *

"You ready for this?" Ai smirked as he was currently sitting on his bike.

"I should be asking you that," Yang smirked back as she was sitting on bumblebee.

"Why are they doing this again?" Blake couldn't help but ask while sitting on a bench.

"They wanted to see who was the fastest, and we had to follow them so they didn't race in the streets like idiots." Natt answered, earning a nod from Blake.

At the moment, they stood in a small dirt bike track in a less frequented part of Vale, with Natt and Blake having followed after their teammates after class went out when they heard them mention about having a race.

"Hey, we wouldn't have gone THAT far...streets at the outskirts tops," Ai said.

"We rest our case," Blake and Natt deadpanned.

"You guys are no fun at all, seriously." Yang said with a sigh as she put on her helmet and her goggles, Ai doing the same as they both revved their engines a bit to warm them up.

Natt sighed, before lifting up his gun, waiting a few second, and firing into the air, the two racers taking off at the signal.

The race was immediately off to a heated start as both racers gunned their vehicles to the max, going down the tracks. The track wasn't exactly top level being mainly a large oval with the only hazards being a few bumps here and there. Nothing they needed to be too worried about. Immediately Ai showed just why he was considered a champ as he easily navigated the bumps like they were nothing, slowing down just enough to avoid his bike going out of control, but quickly regaining that speed almost immediately till it was like he wasn't even slowing down. Meanwhile, Yang was holding her own quite well, being able to keep pace with him, and even overtake him a time or two, but as it was, Ai seemed to have the main lead even if it was close. Eventually the two reached the last lap and then the last stretch, to which both gunned the engines as much as possible, and eventually they crossed the finish line, with Natt having to do a photo finish...with his Semblance.

"Who won?!" the two asked quickly.

"Dear Oum you two are annoying about this." Natt muttered as he closed his eyes and thought back on the slowed down view, nodding to himself "It was a tie." he said as he opened his eyes back up.

"What?! Another round!" the two said, in unison again.

"If you have the money to buy more time, you did pay to have three laps on the track after all." Blake said dryly, looking up from her book.

THAT stopped the two of them short...before they turned to each other. "Rematch when we've got more cash," they said. At the same time.

Natt and Blake groaned at the reaction. It seemed these two wouldn't give it a rest anytime soon. "Let's just go back to Beacon," Blake sighed.

The group of four were soon on the way back, but along the way, they noticed a rather down looking man sitting on a bench, heaving a heavy sigh.

Ai rose an eyebrow at the man, before going closer "Something the matter sir?"

"Oh nothing you need to worry about. Sides, you kids with promising futures shouldn't worry about a washout like me," the man said despondently.

"Promising futures as hunters, yeah, someone remind me the life expectancy of that job and why we took it again?" Natt said in a bit of dark humor.

"It's still got to be better than my prospects," the man sighed again.

"Come on, it can't be THAT bad, right?" Ai tried to cheer him up.

"If I don't meet my quota by the end of the month, I'm out," the man said simply.

"Ah… yeah that's bad." Yang said after a moment, before wincing when Blake slapped her arm.

"What are you selling?" the black haired girl decided to ask.

"A collection of classic stories and books," he said. "Would you like to buy some?"

"Sure, curious about the stories you have here… in Vale." Ai said, remembering to add the last part just to be safe.

"I'll buy one too." Blake added.

"Sure. The racetrack only took cash, but if you have one of those machine things I have credit." Yang said with a shrug.

"I do." the man said hopefully, taking out a credit card scanner from his coat.

"I'll take one too." Natt added, seeing no reason to say no to the man.

"Thank you for your patronage," the man said with a small smile as he took the cash and credit, before giving them the books from the briefcase he had with him. "Now I only need to sell about 7 more to meet my quota...in about 5 days," he sighed, though it wasn't as heavy as it was before.

"Well, chin up man. You've still got 5 whole days. I'm sure there will be people who want to buy some of these books," Ai said encouragingly. "If you start thinking you're gonna lose, you really will. You gotta start by believing you can do it, then I'm sure you'll get it if you work for it," he said.

"Y-you really think so?" the man asked.

"I know so," Ai grinned.

The man started to smile, before he let out a pained gasp, and his body was covered in static.

"Oh Oum dammit." Blake muttered as she saw the static.

"Already calling an ambulance." Yang said as she grabbed her scroll.

"Good thing we were here." Natt said as he strapped his driver on, Ai mimicking him.

"These guys are really getting annoying though." the racer grumbled as he and Natt grabbed their gashats.

" **BAKUSOU BIKE!"**

" **BANG BANG SHOOTING!"**

"Henshin!" " **I'M A KAMEN RIDER!"** One quick transformation, and the Level 1 forms of Snipe and Lazer stood, as the pixels spread over the man's body and then separated from him, coalescing into…

"Huh… well, we found my enemy." Lazer said as he looked at the large wheel for a moment.

"Doesn't matter. We'll shoot it down like all the others," Snipe said simply before opening fire on it, while the girls made sure to move the victim out of harm's way.

The wheel began to spin like crazy as it tried to run them over, but both of them evaded the attack, and returned fire, the wheel soon turning around and going for them a second time.

"This thing is pretty fast, but its not very versatile is it?" Lazer mused as fired on the wheel again. However, even as they scored hits, the wheel kept coming. "But then, this guy isn't really slowing down now is he?"

"Guess we'd better tip the wheel over then," Snipe frowned.

"Then make hole for it to lose balance in," Lazer grinned, right as the wheel was coming for them again. Acting quickly they opened fire on the ground, their attacks making a sizeable pothole...and one the wheel ran right over, causing it to lose balance and land on its side.

"Fire in the hole!" Snipe commanded as they opened fire with everything they got, doing massive damage to the Bugster Union as it soon broke down.

The minor Bugsters this time seemed to be mechanics, although there was one holding a large checkered flag.

The main Bugster though had a mostly gold body with blue and silver highlights, exhaust pipes coming out of his back.

"Well, that was a record time you guys annoyed me in." the Bugster said, before slapping one of the minor ones behind the head and turning it into a motorcycle which he got onto.

"Motors, right? What exactly do you think you're doing?" Lazer asked, his hand inching towards the lever.

"What's it look like? I plan on living you idiot!" Motors said, before suddenly burning out and making a spin, causing smoke cloud to actually come out from the wheel, which he used to zoom towards the bench and… grabbed the briefcase they had forgotten was still there.

"Put the briefcase down, dirtbag," Snipe said dangerously.

"Not a chance," Motors smirked. "Buuut, I'm a sportsman at heart. I'm willing to give you a chance to try and get it back before I torch it," he smirked.

"Sportsman means you want a fight on equal footing right? Alright then." Lazer said, before he and Snipe flipped the levers.

"Second Lap." " **LEVEL UP! BAKUSOU BIKE!"**

"Second Tactic." " **LEVEL UP! BANG BANG SHOOTING!"**

Instead of human form, Lazer opted to go into his bike form, with Snipe getting the idea and climbing onto his back.

"So, lemme guess, you got a course in mind for us to run?" Snipe asked.

"Obviously. And I'm a Bugster of my word, so on the off chance you two win, the briefcase is yours… though we WILL still fight." Motors explained, before gesturing to his grunts to set things up.

To the… confused panic of the few people that lived in this section of Vale, they all watched as a racetrack was being set up around the streets, a rather large one with several twists and turns… and power up items were placed around the track as well, including ramps and strange panels with arrows on them.

"Okay...so we're gonna have to win a game of Bakusou Bike to get that briefcase back," Snipe frowned as he and Lazer got to the starting line.

"Just be careful. Bakusou Bike is like Mario Kart, so aside from making sure we get to the finish line first, we gotta be careful for stage hazards AND any items Motors might try to use on us. Of course the same also applies to him," Lazer cautioned.

"Right. Remind me again how this works when you have a rider," Snipe said.

"I handle the items and speed. You handle the steering," Lazer said.

"Got it," Snipe nodded.

"Hope you two are ready to lose," Motors said with a smirk as he rolled up next to them, the minor Bugsters all in position.

"We should be the ones asking you that." Lazer shot back as he revved his engine.

The Red light came on, before the second one came on, the racers revving up their engines as they got ready, and when the green light came on, they were soon speeding down the track.

The track Motors had picked was a fairly advanced one with a mix of turns and straight lanes as well as a few slopes and hills, making it so Snipe had to focus completely on steering, while Lazer had to keep slowing down and speeding up to maintain control. Likewise, Motors wasn't having much difficulty navigating due to both being familiar with the track and cause he was literally in his element here. "Get ready, we're getting to an item line!" Lazer said, earning a nod from Snipe who steered so that they had ran right into an item box. "We got the oil shooter item!" Lazer reported.

"Right, in that case..." Snipe nodded as up next was a straight lane, to which Lazer gunned his engine to full power, the two of them getting in position a little behind Motors who had taken the lead, before Snipe aimed and fired, a stream of ink flying out and hitting Motors.

"What the hell?!" Motors shouted as he was covered head to toe in ink, including covering his eyes, as he suddenly swerved around and crashed into a wall.

"Heh. Classic," both Riders chuckled as they took the lead.

They took advantage of the time to get as much of a lead as possible, as the effects of the item soon wore off and Motors was in hot pursuit again.

"Oil gun me, eh? Well say hello to my little pal!" Motors snarled before revealing something Lazer could see via side mirrors...which made him panic.

"HE'S GOT A BLUE SHELL!" Lazer shouted as he gunned his engine, going as fast as he could to the next item lane.

"Ohshitohshitohshitohshitohshit!" Snipe muttered, even when not an avid mario kart player, he knew how bad that item was.

"Kiss your butts goodbye!" Motors grinned as he threw the item, just as the two Riders hit an item box.

"Please be a Honker! Please be a Honker! Please be a…" Lazer muttered almost feverishly until the item revealed was…. "A Honker! Halleluyah!" he grinned and activated it without a moment's hesitation...just as the Blue Shell was on top of them, causing the shell to break.

"Lucky Bastards! You won't get so lucky THIS time!" Motors shouted as he hit an item box and got...a bazooka. "Fire in the hole!"

The missile was fast, and since the path had become more narrow, the two couldn't evade it and were left skidding out of control when the explosion hit, both a bit dazed, before Motors passed them.

Once the spinning stopped, the two shook their heads to clear the dizziness, and quickly gunned the engine to go after Motors.

The race through Vale continued at a see saw pace as each contestant kept finding ways to take the lead whenever they fell behind, and before long, they'd gone through most of the track, with the final stretch soon ahead of them...and Motors was in the lead.

"Last chance. If we don't pass him soon, we're losing the race...and likely that guy's life," Lazer growled.

"Give it everything you have. I'll make sure to maintain control," Snipe said and Lazer did just that, slowly but surely gaining, but Motors had enough of a lead that at this rate they'd lose. With that, they soon got their last hope. An item box.

Smashing through it, Lazer furiously kept up the pace while praying for an item that could help them...until he got just that. "Hey Motors! Catch!"

Motors spared a glance….and paled when he saw a Blue Shell flying for him...and the only item he had was another frontal attack item. In short… "DAMMIT!" he shouted as the Blue Shell hit, giving the Riders the chance they needed to pull past him, and cross the finish line, grabbing the briefcase that was floating at the finish.

"In your face!" Lazer shouted.

"That was harder than I thought it would be." Snipe said.

The crowd was cheering.

"... Wait… we had a crowd?" Lazer asked slowly.

"Oh those? They kinda joined in in the middle of the race," Motors said simply...before revving up his engine. "And now that you've won, I ain't going down without a fight. So bring it!"

"Oh I am totally bringing it! Snipe! Get off!" Lazer said.

"Alright then." Snipe said simply and got off, already knowing what his teammate was going for and closing and opening his driver for him.

" **GEAR SHIFT!"**

Lazer cracked his neck as he shifted into humanoid form, before taking out his Gashat and placing it in the Kimewaza slot, pushing down the button.

" **KIMEWAZA!"**

Lazer crouched low as the energy coursed through him, with Motors revving his engine eagerly.

"All or nothing!" Motors grinned before he gunned the engine forward, right as Lazer's energy was done charging, and he pressed the button again.

" **BAKUSOU CRITICAL STRIKE!"**

Lazer took off in a run, before pouncing ahead, his foot first towards Motors, as the two seemed to pass by each other harmlessly, Lazer landing and Motors hitting the brakes… before Motors slumped over and promptly exploded.

" **GAME CLEAR!"**

Lazer sighed as he stood back straight, before noticing a gauge on his screen filling, and he was glad he'd taken the advance warning and muted the announcements as he read it "Huh… looks like my engine got an upgrade, I got a higher top speed now."

"That'll probably come in handy eventually." Snipe said with a nod as the two made their back towards where Yang and Blake were waiting.

Once they were there they untransformed, seeing the girls helping the businessman onto the stretcher, going to the hospital just as a precaution, while Ai went up to the man with the briefcase in hand "Here you go sir, your books are all safe."

The man smiled gratefully as he accepted the briefcase "Thanks a lot. Now let's hope I can manage to sell the rest of them fast enough." he said with a chuckle as he was loaded onto the ambulance which was soon on it's way.

"You know… you two handled this one pretty quickly." Yang commented after a moment.

"I guess we just got lucky that Motors was a racer, the kind who's pretty straightforward." Natt said, breathing a sigh of relief at that.

"Well, how about we get back to the Academy now? I think we had a good day out." Blake said with a barely noticeable smirk as they made their way back towards the air docks, glad to have handled the situation today.

* * *

"Right… progress on the virus is going fine…" Chroma muttered as looked at his computer, before moving away from it and towards another one.

"And these… are finally finished." he said with a grin, as he glanced at a set of five Gashats plugged into a box that was connected to the computer, each a different color: light green, red, light yellow, orange and black.

"Time to move onto the next Level." Chroma said with a smirk.

* * *

 **And there's the chapter!**

 **So, yeah, Leo is fully a good guy here, discreetly getting information from Salem and giving it to Ozpin.**

 **The reason?**

 **He's more afraid of Chroma than he is of Salem.**

 **As for Qrow, he was called back early precisely because Leo is getting information himself.**

 **Anyway, hope you enjoyed that little chapter with a dose of Mario Kart, and we'll see you next time!**


	13. Level 8

**It's time for the next one!**

 **So, to inform everyone, we're going to be dropping the writting of a lot of sound effects starting with this chapter, to simplify our workload for this story, because having to stop to write each sound effect is tedious, so we're cutting down on that.**

 **Besides that though, we're finally entering the Level 3 world, hope you're ready for it!**

* * *

"Alright… it should be fully clear of bugs now. Usually sweep number 5 is always the one it's fully cleaned up… but I should probably go test it out first anyway to be safe." Chroma muttered as finished tapping on his computer, before looking at the Gashats he was working on, grabbing the light green one and pulling it out, with a sticker on it that had a silhouette riding a mountain bike and pulling tricks with it, with the name of the game being Shakariki Sports.

Soon he was riding down on an elevator, till he entered a room that could be mistaken for a sort of command center, where Duo and Spring seemed to be using to… just laze about and play a fighting game together.

"Having fun you two?" Chroma said with amusement.

"Oh yeah, the system is working fine," Duo said. "I think we've gotten all the bugs out of the game this time."

"Though we're guessing you're not here for that, right?" Spring said knowingly.

"Of course. Time to test the new product," Chroma said, holding up the new Gashat.

The two siblings looked at it, and quickly turned to each other. "Dibs on the Bugsters!" Duo managed to say first, causing Spring to pout as her brother just grinned back and walked over to where a control panel was.

Chroma chuckled and walked towards the door, patting his daughter's shoulder on the way "You'll get them next time." he said, before walking through the door and down a set of stairs, entering a large, empty room, that only had the door he came out from and a glass window where Duo and Spring were watching him.

He quickly strapped his driver to himself and took out his main gashat, activating it without preamble " **MIGHTY ACTION X!"** and holding it above the driver "Henshin, Grade 2." he said and slotted the gashat in while pulling the driver open at the same time " **MIGH~TY ACTIO~N X!"** and left him in Genmu's armor.

He turned his head towards the window, before nodding as he held Shakariki Sports in his hand, ready to use it.

"Sending in two Bugsters dad." Spring said as two holographic copies of Salty and Motors appeared.

"Right then." Genmu nodded to himself and held up the Gashat, pushing the button down.

" **SHAKARIKI SPORTS!"** The usual game screen appeared behind him, but instead of boxes or whatever jumping out, full of energy items, instead, out came… a pink and neon green mountain bike… with eyes on the little panel between the two handlebars.

"Summoning of the Sports Gamer works out fine." Genmu said with a nod, before placing the gashat into the Kimewaza slot, but not pushing the button as he grabbed the bike and got onto it.

"Beginning combat simulation in 3...2...1!" Spring prompted, as Duo began operating the controls, the two Bugsters moving to his command. Immediately both charged forward, going for a frontal assault, but right as they got close, Genmu hiked up on the bike's back wheel and actually did a bunny hop trick...using their heads as springboards, before landing on his front wheel and using the back wheel to slap both of them aside.

"Basic movements seem normal," Duo noted before quickly commanding Salty to charge forward, with Motors behind, having summoned his bike and was riding around the two, looking for an opening. However, Genmu didn't wait for them as he began pedaling towards them and pulling into a bunny hop, but in mid air he spun the bike around, catching both Bugsters, causing them to fall on their butts. They tried to get up, but Genmu soon came back and started punching and kicking them all the while maintaining control of the bike. Suffice to say he was completely owning them.

"Advanced controls and reactions working nicely," Spring and Duo nodded, before Duo added, "But are you not planning to test the full Level 3?"

"Not just yet." Genmu said "We know it would destroy them easily. So I want to save it for a field test against an actual Level 3 Bugster."

"That's… fair." Spring said after a moment, not really seeing anything wrong with her father's logic.

"Well then, let's see if I can at least make these guys start to make you sweat," Duo shrugged, before both Salty and Motors began charging up energy and surged forward, Salty's arms ignited with energy, while Motors looked like he was going for a head on tackle with the momentum of his bike.

"Nice try, but no dice," Genmu chuckled before he finally pushed down the silver button " **KIMEWAZA!"** and started pedalling towards the two bugsters for the inevitable clash.

* * *

"So… is this really going to work?" Ai wondered as the boys were in the dorm room, watching as Retsu was setting up several games, his hair on the teal side.

"It'll get you used to our next power ups, I swear, I know it's weird, but hey, from the few episodes I saw, Ex-Aid was a weird series… till the original Lazer died." the gamer answered, making the racer wince at the reminder.

"So… that's why you don't trust Chroma at all. Because you're thinking he could be like that Kuroto guy from the show." Natt said.

"I can certainly understand why you would be wary, considering what his goal was from the info you have." Edler mused.

"Yeah, some kind of super game or whatever, all I can figure is that Dangerous Zombie is just a first step. So, if he ever offers one of you to use that Gashat, take it, but don't use it, and then kick his ass." Restu recommended, getting serious as his hair shifted to orange.

"Anyway, our possibly evil sponsor aside, what were the games you said our 'Level 3' forms would be again?" Ai said, changing the subject to a more lighter one.

"Oh right," Retsu nodded, his hair shifting to teal again. "First is mine, Gekitotsu Robots. It's basically a robot fighting game, so that one is fairly straightforward. Next is Edler, who gets Doremifa Beat, which as you all know is the game Poppy comes from, meaning its a Rhythm game where the more you hit the notes the higher the score, or damage in this case. Third is Natt's which is Jet Combat, an aerial shooter game, so basically the next level to his game genre. Last in the show was Ai's game, Giri Giri Chambara, which from what I can tell is a sword based fighting game, so it's a close range option for Lazer...and it was actually humanoid in the show," Retsu explained.

"Wait, the original Lazer was either a chibi or a bike till he got that?" Ai asked with a twitching eyebrow.

"Basically, I guess the one good thing Chroma did was add Gear Shift to your gashat." Retsu said with a shrug. "At any rate, those were the Level 3 Gashats. I know there was a Level 5 Gashat coming, Drago Knight Hunter Z, which is basically a Monster Hunter style game, so its best used when there are more than one player, and if Chroma whips out Dangerous Zombie, run like heck. That one is a Level 10… though he wrote it with the roman numeral for some reason," Retsu continued.

"Right, so we'll need to practice teamwork for Level 5, and perfect zombie hunting if we end up having to worry about Level 10." Natt said, already trying to think of strategies.

"The way Level 5 will work is we'll each get a piece of the armor, Ex-Aid gets a helmet that can breathe fire, a tail he can whip around, and wings that I think should be able to help float about. Brave gets an arm mounted sword, while Snipe gets an arm mounted rail gun, well, it LOOKS like a rail gun at least. And Lazer gets both the sword and gun. There IS the single player option, but Ex-Aid went berserk when he did that in the show," Retsu added at the end. "Also… Dangerous Zombie was… bizarre. To start, in the show it needed the data of death to fully work, and on top of that, I remember his health bar being ALREADY empty, though I don't know the full details of how that works, so if we DO have to fight it, it might be harder than just 'how to kill a zombie'..."

"Somehow I get the feeling it's an aggravating gimmick." Ai muttered.

"Where there any other gashats you might know about?" Edler asked.

"Well… there's one. Mighty Brothers XX. I assume it was for Ex-Aid, and apparently it even appears in the crossover movie, but I didn't see it. Judging by how, just like Dangerous Zombie, it uses the roman numeral for 10, but in this case, there's two of it, it's possible it was Level 20. We'll see if I end up getting it." Retsu answered with a shrug.

"And since it was still early in the show, there are probably more Gashats that you don't know about," Natt mused, before shrugging. "Well, no point worrying about that now. We'll just have to figure it out as it comes."

"Still, training using a video game is certainly a unique idea." Edler mused.

"It's also the easiest way to train without attracting attention." Retsu said with a grin.

"Not to mention we're literally superheroes who draw power from video games. VIDEO GAMES," Ai said. "And yes, the second emphasis was cause I realized how ridiculous that sounds out loud."

"And we have a doctor and… I guess the rest of us would be interns in a way. And we save lives in a crapsaccharine world which has been slowly getting better." Natt commented.

"Welcome to Kamen Rider." Retsu said dryly before pointing everyone to their games.

* * *

Meanwhile, far away in the Kingdom of Atlas, a popular restaurant was serving its customers during the lunch hour.

However, the business day was sadly anything but peaceful...just as it always was.

"Why is this steak so warm?! I wanted it colder than this! And I asked for a 30 year old wine, yet this one is only 29 years old!" came the irate voice of a man sitting at a table.

The manager of the restaurant let out a tired sigh, as he really never could go a day without some kind of customer complaint. If they had all been valid then he could accept that the restaurant was doing something wrong, but as it was, the lion's share of the complaints he normally received were over the pettiest of things. "I apologize, sir. However, I am afraid we are out of wine that is exactly 30 years old. As for the steak, we cooked it to the temperature that is optimum for it, and cooled it as best as we could before serving it to you," he sighed. "If you would like, perhaps I could offer you some 40 year old wine which we do have in stock, and while we get it, I am certain the steak will cool to the temperature you desire."

"I asked SPECIFICALLY for 30! I don't want 40 year old wine!" the man exclaimed, and several people had thoughts they decided to keep to themselves, including the man's wife who was sitting across from him.

'Dear Oum he can really be a petulant child when he wants to. At least I know where Whitley gets it from.' was the thoughts of one Willow Schnee as she pinched the bridge of her nose, feeling absolutely DONE with her husband's bullshit. 'I can't wait for Chroma to send me those papers so I can divorce this idiot.' she mentally mused, glad she had made a friend of the Genmu Corp CEO.

"Sir, please be reasonable. We cannot get the wine you request at the exact age you request at the drop of a hat," the manager sighed again. "If it is really that unacceptable than we will not charge for the wine, but please refrain from causing a scene," he said, before mentally adding 'More than you already are anyway…'

"Causing a scene?! I am WITHIN my rights!" Jacques Schnee practically screamed at the manager "I don't care if you're unable to get it at the drop of a hat, you'll just have to search longer then! Or I can just buy you out and bankrupt your restaurant!"

"Sir, please. It is just a bottle of wine. Don't you think you're be-" the manager tried again, but before he could finish, he suddenly stopped, his eyes widening as he felt something wrong with himself, and before anyone could react, he tipped over and face planted into the table (right on top of the steak at that), causing it to fall over...and conveniently spill the wine on one Jacques Schnee.

"What do you thi-" he couldn't finish speaking as Willow stood up and checked on the manager.

"Jacques, stop talking right now, or I'll tell the police you caused the man's symptoms to worsen." she said, glaring at her husband as she helped the man off the table and saw his body shifting with pixels "Game Disease. It's rare over here in Atlas." she mused "Somebody call an ambulance!" she shouted into the restaurant, hearing someone scramble in the kitchens, most likely to do that.

* * *

Meanwhile, back in Vale, Chroma was just going over the battle data gathered from the test when the alarm came on. It was a Game Disease emergency in another Kingdom.

"Well shit." he summed up his feelings about that, before his scroll started going off at the same time, picking it up and answering as he started walking "Chroma speaking."

"It's me." came Willow's voice from the other end "I was at the restaurant when the manager collapsed while Jacques was throwing a tantrum about not having exactly what he wanted."

"Well, at least I have someone to blame for this. Thanks for informing me Willow." Chroma said as he started going down on the elevator, which soon stopped, opening to let Duo join him and then kept going down again.

"Anytime. Normally I'd ask about the papers or how Weiss is doing, but we can save that for when there isn't a life on the line." Willow said with a sigh.

"Of course, I'll see you later." Chroma said before hanging up and storing away his scroll.

"Which kingdom?" was all Duo asked.

"Atlas, we can thank Jacques for stressing out someone enough they collapsed." Chroma snarked.

"...how many does that make now?" Duo deadpanned.

"That's actually the first in the last 2 months. An actual record," Chroma said, sarcasm dripping from his voice. Honestly, a good number of the Game Disease cases in Atlas could be traced back to Jacques or anyone else like him...and there were a LOT of them in Atlas. "Get the CR Express ready. And call the boys. I think it's about time they got to try our special express transportation."

"You didn't tell them what this entails, did you?" Duo deadpanned again. The troll grin he got in response said it all, causing him to sigh. "Don't come running to us when they go after you with swords and guns," he shrugged before getting the preparations ready.

* * *

"Poppy… what are we looking at right now?" Retsu asked slowly, his hair on orange.

"The state of the art express transit system between kingdoms!" the hybrid bugster answered in her usual peppy tone.

"So this...train system if you will...can get us between kingdoms in the time needed to respond AND cure a Game Disease outbreak?" Edler asked, sounding a bit skeptical, especially considering the distance...and the Grimm problem.

"Of course, it's a high speed underground shuttle bullet." Poppy answered as if it was simple.

"Wait… does that mean it's faster than the one we used to get to the hospital?" Ai asked in trepidation.

"Of course it is, why wouldn't it be?" Poppy asked with a raised eyebrow.

Silence for a moment, till Natt broke it "We're doomed."

"Aww come on, its not THAT bad...though you may want to have barf bags ready just in case," she added at the end.

"...the urge to kill Chroma is rising," Ai deadpanned at the statement.

* * *

One VERY fast train ride later…

… and one 5 person group unloading their stomachs into barf bags later…

"I want to kill your dad, I hope you realise this." Retsu groaned as he and the others followed Poppy.

"Trust me, a lot of people have tried, he's pretty good at kicking ass even without transforming." Poppy said with her own groan as she turned back into Spring wearing a nurse's outfit on the way.

The boys also grabbed their doctor's coats on the way, before they entered what was obviously the CR of Atlas, looking rather similar, except the room was a bit more blue compared to the white of the one in Vale.

Also Chroma was there, a shit eating grin on his face, while Duo was staying clear from his father for the moment, knowing he was the target of some ire.

"We will KILL you." Ai muttered darkly.

"You can try." was Chroma's response, grin still on his face.

"Oh we will someday, we will…" the four boys said darkly with looks that promised murder some day in the future.

"I swear to Oum dad, sometimes it's like you have a death wish." Duo sighed, getting the attention of the boys.

"Who're you?" Natt asked curiously.

"That would be my brother, Duo." Spring answered.

"Oh, so this is your brother. Nice to meet you," Retsu said, holding out a friendly hand to Duo.

"Nice to meet you too. I've been looking forward to meeting the Riders dad picked. Sorry in advance for anything he does that makes you want to kill him. It's a long list nowadays," Duo said before deadpanning at the end.

"Mom's the only one who can handle his insanity most likely, considering she married him." Spring added idly.

"Noted." the four boys said in perfect unison.

"ANYway, we shouldn't waste time. The patient is waiting," Chroma said.

"Dad's right. Follow me," Spring said as they boys followed her to the CR room. "The patient is one Michelin Silver, age 35. He's the manager of a well known fine dining restaurant in Atlas. It seems he has to deal with the rather...snobbish...upper class of Atlas fairly often, so no doubt his job was stressful as is, but it seems what broke the camel's back was when a recent customer threatened to buy the restaurant just to ruin it...over a bottle of wine that was, and I quote '29 years old when he ordered 30 year old wine'," Spring deadpanned at the end.

That made the boys stop short "Wait… seriously?" Ai asked after a moment, incredulous.

"Who would get mad over such a trivial thing?" Edler asked in disgust.

"Weiss's father, Jacques Schnee, kind of an asshole." Chroma answered from behind them as he was letting them take the reins for this one.

"Her dad is THAT petty?" Natt asked with a raised eyebrow.

"He's the type who likes to make sure everyone knows he's got money and power," Chroma said flatly. "He's an unscrupulous businessman who will make sure he gets what he wants and he REALLY doesn't care who he has to step on to get it. He's literally on my list of 'I may not bother saving if they get infected'."

"That's… dark." Retsu said after a moment.

"Yeah, well Willow would probably thank me." Chroma said with a roll of his eyes.

"Okay, let's move on from the fact that there's a guy who is seriously that petty and he fathered Weiss, and focus on the part of saving an innocent man's life," Ai said after a few moments, and with that the four of them entered the room, to find the patient fortunately resting, as he'd been explained before hand that additional stress would only make the symptoms worse.

"Alright, before you all begin," Spring started as she, Duo, and Chroma were in the observation room. "The Bugster Strain has been diagnosed. Its Charlie's virus strain."

"That one is from the game Shakariki Sports, right?" Natt mused.

"Oh yeah, wasn't that that extreme sports game? The one where you need to perform all sorts of sick tricks with various sports equipment to get the high score?" Ai said.

"So we can infer that Charlie will be going at us with various sports based tricks then. Might be annoying," Retsu frowned, his hair currently orange.

"Alright then, let's begin the operation," Edler said as the four of them equipped their Gamer Drivers and lifted their Gashats "Henshin." the four said together and pushed down on the buttons to activate them and inserted them into the Drivers, changing into their Level 1 forms.

As soon as they did, the patient winced in his sleep as his body was completely covered in orange pixels.

Acting quickly they pressed another button. " **STAGE SELECT!"**

Once the pixels cleared they were in a snowfield just outside of Atlas, making for plenty of empty space to fight. The orange pixels soon converged and formed a Bugster Union...in the form of a giant mountain bike.

"The Bugster Unions really aren't that creative, are they?" Ex-Aid commented.

"I don't complain. They're just bigger targets," Snipe said, before opening fire.

The Bugster didn't take being attacked lying down though, as it immediately started to spin around, and while the shots hit, they didn't do as much damage as normal. Once the shots ended, the Bugster turned to face them and started charging forward.

The four of them didn't waste any time, as Lazer and Snipe dodged to the side, while Ex-Aid and Brave jumped upward. The two who dodged to the side opened fire on the Bugster Union, hitting its sides and causing damage, while the two who jumped upward, managed to use some blocks generated from the Mighty Action X Gashat to get on top of the Bugster Union...albeit with a somewhat questionable result.

"Someone stop this crazy thing!" Ex-Aid shouted as he and Brave were hanging on for dear life on the handles and seat respectively, albeit using their other hand to strike at the Bugster with their weapons, scoring hits, but not quite slowing it down.

"You'd think taking out a bike would be easy," Lazer growled as he was currently shooting at the wheels of the bike.

"It's a Bugster. They don't exactly follow the rules of the norm," Snipe commented with a scowl under his helmet.

"Doesn't seem like we're making a notable dent as things are," Brave frowned from where he was hanging on to the Bugster, before turning to Ex-Aid. "Can you find an energy item? They're likely our best bet here!"

"Got it! Leave the items to me!" Ex-Aid nodded, as he stopped hitting the bike and focused on finding a box that might have an item in it. Spotting a nearby block, he made a jump for it, and broke it open, revealing an energy item colored a pale red, depicting the character stretching its arm. "This can work!" Ex-Aid said as he used his hammer to slap the item towards Brave, who quickly grabbed hold of the item. " **STRETCH!"**

Acting quickly, Brave extended his arm and started wrapping around the bike, grabbing hold of key parts and joints, while jamming his sword into the section of the pedal that controls the wheels, causing the Bugster to slowly slow down, before finally stopping, and falling over without any momentum.

"Its down!" Snipe said as he leveled his gun again.

"And before that, I got a few more good ones!" Ex-Aid said as he knocked another Energy item towards Brave, while he grabbed one he had, all of them the same type. " **MUSCULAR!"**

"Let's finish this phase quickly," Brave nodded, as he and Ex-Aid readied their weapons and brought them down, breaking the bike in half, while Lazer and Snipe opened fire on the broken halves, Snipe making use of his new explosive ammo to do additional damage, causing the parts to break apart, and begin to form the Bugster's main body.

The Bugsters that emerged were… interesting to say the least. There were dressed like punks and rebels, moving around on skateboards and bikes… most of which got stuck in the snow.

The lead Bugster however had a pale metallic blue body with yellow circles on his chest and knees, springs on his shoulders, and his head shaped like a bicycle helmet, and he was leaning on a bicycle himself.

"Well… you guys sure cut off my fun quickly, bringing me out into the snow." the Bugster, Charlie, said, a tone of annoyance in his voice.

"What did you expect we'd do? Fight you in the middle of a city?" Ex-Aid deadpanned, before the four of them pulled the levers and quickly leveled up to their Level 2 forms.

"The city? Great idea," Charlie laughed, before sending the grunts after them...about as well as the Grunts could seeing as some of them were getting caught in the snow.

"Guess we're gonna have to deal with these chumps as usual," Lazer frowned as he pulled out the Gashacon Sparrow.

"It's better this way. Then when we get to the Bugster, we can focus fully," Snipe said as he began opening fire, taking out the Bugsters that were stuck first.

"Charge!" Ex-Aid called out as they charged forward, striking at the various Grunts with their weapons, while evading any who tried to attack them, then countering. Lazer in particular was making liberal use of his weapon's dual forms of a bow and twin sickles to take out several of the Grunts quickly.

"Get them close. This is taking too long," Brave said, earning nods from his teammates, as they began herding the Grunts together, and when they were together, Brave quickly activated his new Lightning sword option, and stabbed the ground, causing a blast of electricity to surge under the Grunts, and they were all soon hit with a massive blast of electricity, causing them all to fade away.

"That's all of them. Now for the main prize," Snipe said as they all turned to the tracks left in the snow… headed for the city.

"Gah! The bastard tricked us!" Ex-Aid exclaimed in shock.

"He's probably heading for the restaurant." Lazer said.

"Let's go then." Brave said as the four started to run back into the city.

Meanwhile, in the city itself…

"Coming through!" Charlie said with a laugh as he sped on the sidewalk, forcing people to jump out of the way.

"Let's go Bikey!" he added as he jumped onto a car parked next to the sidewalk, denting the roof as he bunny hopped on it a few times before getting into the street and starting to weave through the oncoming traffic.

Suffice to say with how Charlie was navigating through Atlas, the city had been thrown into a degree of chaos as everyone was forced to avoid the Bugster, while various vehicles and buildings gained new dents from the Bugster. Eventually, he could see his prize in sight, the restaurant his host worked at. If he wrecked the place, then he'd be able to increase the stress level. Riding down a curved roof and launching off of the roof, he aimed to ram right into the building, and for a moment he made a rather picture perfect sight being in mid-air as the snow fell. "Bikey my friend…" Charlie started...and that was as far as he got when Ex-Aid riding on Lazer rammed into him in mid-air, knocking him completely off course.

"Seriously? ET? You do realize you're missing the alien, right?" Lazer commented having recognized the line Charlie had been trying to bastardize.

"Ruin my fun will you," Charlie growled, quickly getting onto his bike. "Okay, if that's what you want, then let's go!" he said as he started cycling towards them, pulling upwards and suddenly jumping towards them on his bike. None of them waited for him to finish as they opened fire, but when they did, the attacks bounced off the aura that suddenly covered the bike and its rider, before the hit the ground, creating a sudden shockwave and a small explosion, forcing them all back.

"He's strong. Stronger than the other Bugsters we've fought so far," Snipe frowned.

"Of course. I'm at Level 5," Charlie said proudly.

"Okay, that's going to be a bit of a problem," Lazer frowned as Ex-Aid got off of him so he could Gear Shift back into his humanoid form.

"But still doable for us to fight back," Ex-Aid said to which the four of them nodded in agreement and got ready.

"Fine I'll take you all on!" Charlie grinned before he pedaled forward, and suddenly got on the front wheel, allowing him to spin around and hit them with the back wheel, which released bursts of energy, making it difficult for them to come closer, or even hit him for that matter. When he was done, he quickly pulled into bunny hops and caused small bursts wherever he landed, tearing up the streets and generally making it VERY difficult for the four to even start to counter attack, making for a stalemate with Charlie in the advantage.

"Okay, this is getting ridiculous!" Ex-Aid growled. "We're not getting any openings to even start to come closer!"

"The level difference may not be so high that we can't overcome it, but it's high enough to make this rather difficult," Brave frowned.

"But we don't have a choice. We'll have to keep looking for an opening," Snipe said, earning nods from his teammates.

And then suddenly someone jumped in and kicked Charlie in the head while shouting "Dynamic Entry!"

The four riders stared ahead, shared looks of deadpan beneath their helmets "Seriously?"

"What? That shit's always fun to do." Genmu said with a shrug.

"Point," Lazer admitted. "So I'm guessing you've got something to turn the tide if you show up now?"

"But of course." Genmu said, and lifted out the Shakariki Sports gashat from the holder on the side of his belt.

"A Level 3 gashat, then, their finished?" Ex-Aid asked in surprise.

"Almost, I finished the bug testing of Shakariki Sports just earlier today, I still need to do the same for the others." Genmu shot back before turning to Charlie, whom was starting to get back up after falling into a heap with his bike on him "Now… time for a proper demonstration." he said as he pushed the button down, causing the bicycle to jump out from the screen behind him.

" **SHAKARIKI SPORTS!"**

Genmu closed his driver back up, before pointing the gashat downwards "Grade 3." and inserting it into the second slot and opening his Driver back up.

" **LEVEL UP! MIGHTY JUMP! MIGHTY KICK! MIGH~TY ACTIO~N X! AGACHA! SHAKARIKI! SHAKARIKI! BAD BAD! SHAKA TO RIKI TO SHAKARIKI SPORTS!"**

As the second screen jumped out of the driver and passed over Genmu, the bike jumped up, before opening the panels in its frame and dropping onto his shoulders, the back wheel over his right shoulder and the front wheel over his left shoulder, a pink and neon green panel covering his gauges on his chest while a new piece attached to the front of his helmet, looking like a neon green and pink bicycle helmet when seen from straight on.

"Kamen Rider Genmu. Level 3," Genmu announced.

"So you're using the same game I come from. Big deal," Charlie snorted, before pulling into another of his strong jumps...only for Genmu to counter by throwing the wheels like chakrams, hitting him mid-jump and knocking him back.

"True, but games where Bugsters come from are always the best to fight them," Genmu chuckled. "Now then, let's get him boys."

At that the other Riders got their wits back and began attacking the downed Bugster, Lazer and Snipe peppering him with various shots, while Ex-Aid and Brave got close and struck him as many times as they could with their swords.

Charlie growled and quickly got up, sending another shockwave from his bike. "Alright, that's it! Now you've made me angry!" he said before he bunny hopped up a few objects and got to a short roof. "My best move! Charlie Super Impact!" he roared, as he was covered in an aura and hopped off the roof, doing several tricks mid-air as the energy charged up.

"Looks like this is the end of this fight," Genmu mused. "Boys, let's show him what we're made of."

"Can't disagree with that." Ex-Aid said as the four of them took out their gashats and inserted them into their weapons while Genmu inserted the Shakariki Sports gashat into the holder to the side.

" **KIMEWAZA!"**

The energy started to gather up, into the weapons for the four teens, and into one of the chakram wheels for Genmu, before the boys struck first.

" **MIGHTY/TADDLE/BANG BANG/BAKUSOU CRITICAL FINISH!"**

Ex-Aid and Brave both slashed forwards with their swords, sending out blades of energy towards Charlie that cross together into an X, while Snipe and Lazer opened fire with their own weapons, pushing the attack ahead faster, before Genmu finally added his own.

" **SHAKARIKI CRITICAL STRIKE!"**

Throwing the wheel, it ended up behind the other four attacks before seemingly absorbing them into itself as the aura around the wheel became brighter and wilder, crashing into Charlie who had time for one last realisation.

'I have made a big mistake.' were his last thoughts before he exploded as the wheel returned to Genmu.

" **GAME CLEAR!"**

"And that's a wrap," Genmu chuckled as the announcement faded.

* * *

"Alright, we've finished all the tests and we can confirm you've been fully cured, Mr. Silver," Spring said with a smile as the patient thanked them and was released from the CR Center.

"Take care now, and try to take it a bit easier during work...even if I know the clientele can be a bit overly demanding," Chroma said with a small smile.

"I'll try. It's not easy, but I think I've gotten better practice at managing stress," Michelin said.

"And don't worry about Jacques. If he tries anything, well...I've got some proof that he was directly the cause of this outbreak...and a few others before this," Chroma added.

"Yes, that takes a large load off my shoulders," Michelin laughed at the notion, before bidding them farewell.

"Anyway, we'd better get back to Vale. Can't be away for too long," Chroma said. "Speaking of which, the boys got back safely?"

"Oh yeah, Duo went back with them. He confirmed they got back...mostly okay," Spring said.

* * *

Meanwhile…

"Going...to...murder him...then nail...coffin...shut...and throw...into...volcano…!" were the voices of the four riders as they were busy emptying their stomachs in the toilet after the train ride again, Duo right there with them.

"Seriously dad...some days I think you WANT people to try and kill you…" said hybrid bugster groaned as he too was busy heaving.

* * *

 **And there's the chapter!**

 **Can you tell that I hate Jacques?**

 **Seriously, he's a fucking bastard.**

 **Anyway, hope you enjoyed this chapter, and see you next time!**


	14. Level 9

**And here's the next chapter people!**

 **Now, as you might have guessed, we're having the bugsters for the corresponding games pop up now rather than later in the series, since we don't see a use for the copycats honestly.**

 **Anyway, next up is probably easy to guess, so enjoy!**

* * *

"You guys seriously went to Atlas and back in just a few hours?" Ruby asked as currently her team and team SBLE were walking down a hall after class.

"Yeah, guess that's how Genmu was able to respond to so many emergencies throughout the four Kingdoms," Retsu nodded. "Still though…"

The four boys looked rather...ill...remembering the ride. "Gonna kill him so hard...someday…" the four of them mutter murderously.

"Also, your father is an ass Weiss." Ai felt the need to add.

Weiss sighed "What did he do THIS time?"

"He's the reason the patient's symptoms worsened to the point of the Bugster forming." Edler explained.

"Dammit that was a new record to boot." Weiss muttered in annoyance.

"New record of idiocy?" Natt asked with a snort.

"New record for how long he went without causing a Bugster victim to aggravate their symptoms." she answered easily.

"...so many questions, not sure we want to get them answered," Ai groaned. "Just...hope he doesn't do it again anytime soon. We're NOT in a hurry to use that death trap again."

"My stomach is coming out of my mouth if we have to endure a trip like that again…" Retsu groaned.

"Yeesh, how bad was it?" Yang couldn't help but ask.

"Picture the fastest vehicle you've ever ridden on, then multiply the speed by 100." Natt said.

"...how are you four still alive?" was the deadpan summation that Blake came up with.

"Your guess is as good as ours," Edler groaned. "Though I can confirm trips like that are NOT healthy by any means."

"But you have to use it anyway," Yang guessed.

"How else are we supposed to make it from one Kingdom to another in the time needed to perform a Game Disease Operation...and make it back in time to maintain a normal life?" the four of them deadpanned before letting out a long suffering sigh...at the same time.

"I don't envy you guys." Ruby said as she patted Retsu's back.

However, any further discussions were cut short, when they turned a corner...and walked into a hall that looked like a bomb had hit it. "...I know this is a Combat School, but this is too much," Ai blinked almost dumbly.

"Professor Goodwitch isn't going to be happy about this…" Weiss groaned, as true enough, the area was covered in a familiar aura and the objects were soon moved about and reset to their original positions, as if the damage was never done. Turning to the side, they were all met with the sight of a VERY annoyed Glynda Goodwitch, who thankfully stomped right past them, towards the actual perpetrators, a group of third year students. The eight of them quickly got away before the chewing out could begin.

* * *

"Yeesh, you'd think with someone like Professor Goodwitch around, people would think it's better to NOT cause trouble of that scale," Retsu commented once they'd gotten away.

"Apparently not, seeing as this is the third time this week something like that has happened," Blake sighed.

"I just hope this doesn't become a regular thing," Weiss sighed.

Right as she said that, the group heard a rather loud crashing sound from further up ahead, with Weiss groaning at Murphy deciding to be a jerk.

Once they got close to where the crash happened, the could see… well, a welcome sight.

Apparently, Team CRDL had forgotten they could use their scrolls to unlock their doors, and Cardin had tried to break down the door… only now he was stuck halfway through the door.

The group...couldn't help themselves. "Need a hand big guy?" Ai offered, though anyone watching could tell he was fighting hard to NOT burst out laughing.

They couldn't exactly hear what Cardin said from the other side of the door, but it was definitely an insult… plus his teammates looked like they wanted to pick a fight… but they seemed to have enough brain to realise they were outnumbered 2 to 1.

Any further conversation was cut short when… "Mr. Winchester, what on Remnant were you even TRYING to do?" came Glynda's annoyed voice, as said Professor had been in the middle of making her way to her next class...and happened to hear the crashing sound as well.

What followed was a rather comical image of Cardin being pulled out of the hole he'd made, while the hole was soon fixed, and after she got the story….needless to say Teams RWBY and SBLE decided to make themselves scarce. No way they'd want to be around that powder keg, not even if four of them were in Rider Armor...at level 3.

If that was the end of it it would have been fine, but well...suffice to say it seemed there was a LOT of trouble through the week.

It probably didn't help that on top of third and fourth years needing to be reminded of what their supposed to be doing, Team CRDL was getting worse and worse and kept making property damage.

"Jeez, you'd think people would learn over time." Retsu muttered as he watched Cardin try to pry his arm from being stuck in a wall, his team trying to pull him out as well.

"And to think this isn't even the worst of it." Natt added idly.

"The first time was kinda funny. Now… it's honestly pretty sad," Edler deadpanned.

"Think we should even bother?" Ai mused.

"...no, I think we should get out of the way," Retsu said, as he noticed a certain blonde professor coming. Again.

"I feel bad for Professor Goodwitch," Edler sighed, remembering how overworked the woman seemed lately.

"Tell me about it, it's like she fixes this school all by herself." Natt said as he watched the woman use her semblance to pull Cardin out of the wall and fix it back up.

As with the last times, Glynda was less than pleased with them, and once again she looked ready to start chewing them out...or she would have if she didn't suddenly stop short...and a familiar static covered her body.

"Well there's the issue." Ai said as they ran towards the teacher and Edler grabbed his gamescope.

"You idiots make yourselves useful and go contact CR if you know what's good for you. NOW!" Natt said to team CRDL with a heated glare, getting the desired effect of sending them running.

"Strain identified, it appears to be machine related." Edler said as his screen showed an icon shaped like a gear with a screw going through it.

"Then it's probably the Gekitotsu Robots strain, guess it's time to see what the Bugster for that one is." Retsu said as Spring quickly arrived… and by quickly, we mean Ruby was pushing the stretcher while Spring was holding onto her cape.

"CR Express!" Spring managed to say, albeit looking a bit dizzy.

"I was hanging out with Spring when Cardin and his dummies came running, saying Miss Goodwitch was infected with the virus!" Ruby said quickly to explain her presence.

"Well, that explains the fast response then. Come on, let's get her down to the emergency room." Natt said as they loaded Glynda onto the stretcher and rushed her towards the elevator.

* * *

It wasn't long before the group was gathered in the Operation Room, the four of them gathered around Glynda. "I'll admit, I wasn't expecting to end up here, but I suppose it can't be helped," Glynda sighed, as things HAD been pretty stressful for her lately.

"We'd honestly rather nobody need to go through this," Retsu sighed as the four of them put on their Gamer Drivers.

"Fair point," Glynda nodded with a light chuckle. "Very well, I am in your capable hands."

"We'll get this done as fast as we can," Natt nodded as the four of them activated their Gashats, and with a cry of 'Henshin!' all four of them soon transformed into their Level 1 forms, causing the Game Area to spread as they quickly selected a stage, bringing them and the still forming Bugster into the Emerald Forest, though not too deep in as they could still see Beacon up by the cliffs.

"Here it comes!" Lazer said, as the Bugster Union formed, revealing…

"...seriously?" the four of them deadpanned as they were face to face with a giant...rock em sock em robot.

"At least it didn't turn into a Gundam." Ex-Aid said with a sigh.

The Bugster Union's jaw dropped open and had a look of shock on its face suddenly.

"It literally forgot about those things!" the riders realised in equal shock.

"Well, that's too bad for it," Snipe shrugged...before he opened fire, using his new explosive rounds to cause it to stagger back.

"Let's see what trick this one has up its sleeve," Brave frowned, before shifting the Gashacon Sword into ice mode, and froze the ground under the Bugster, causing it to start to lose its balance...and leaving it open to a double strike to the legs from Ex-Aid and Lazer, causing it to lose balance and topple over...forward.

"Timber!" Ex-Aid shouted as they were forced to dodge to the side.

"Don't give it time to recover!" Snipe shouted as the four of them soon piled on, Ex-Aid grabbing a few Muscular Power Items and tossing them to his teammates who began mercilessly attacking the Bugster Union. Eventually, the Bugster couldn't take anymore and broke apart.

"Time for round two," Lazer smirked as they shifted to their Level 2 forms and got ready. The mass of pixels came together, and well…

"Uh...guys? Is it just me, or are there a LOT more pixels than normal?" Ex-Aid blinked.

The result was… worrying, as it was like facing down an army of minor Bugsters, with one lone, red, robotic Bugster with a mechanical claw like right arm.

"Mission Parameters: Sow chaos. Cause damage. Tumble down the regime." the Bugster droned on in a monotone voice.

"Oookay...that's weird," Lazer blinked.

"Destroy All Humans! Destroy All Humans!" the Bugster started to chant, while the grunts materialized some light armor on themselves along with various melee weaponry.

"Well, we can't have THAT happen, now can we?" Snipe frowned, before he and Lazer opened fire on the Grunts, deleting several of them...before the main Bugster stepped in the way, and knocked the attacks aside.

"You will not interfere," the Bugster said flatly.

"Okay, which one is this one?" Brave frowned.

"Uh...I'm pretty sure that's Gatton. He's the final boss of Gekitotsu Robots," Ex-Aid said.

"Okay, that could be an issue, but that depends on his level," Snipe mused.

"Not a BIG problem. If we play our cards right, we can take even higher levels," Lazer said.

"Beginning elimination. Full booting complete. Stage 5," Gatton said in monotone, before walking towards them. Yes, walking. Slow, robotic, movements.

"...you cannot be serious," the four Riders deadpanned, before opening fire again on the Bugster. All the shots hit, but it was clear that Gatton wasn't taking nearly as much damage as Charlie did when they were fighting him.

"Probably should have expected this," Brave frowned. "A robot is no doubt much sturdier than an athlete."

"Yeah, but before we can fight him… I think we have all the others to worry about." Lazer said, glancing around.

The others mimicked his action, noticing they were surrounded by the grunt bugsters "Great, he's got more mooks than the others so far." Snipe grunted.

"Well then, time to go Dynasty Warriors on them." Ex-Aid said, cracking his neck and shifting his weapon to sword mode.

The Grunts were...a bit sturdier than the previous ones they'd fought, but Grunts were Grunts, and they'd started mowing them down. Even Gatton, when he tried to stop them, while he managed to survive the onslaught, his slower speed made his efforts...less than effective.

"This is easier than last time," Lazer chuckled as they easily evaded Gatton's fist and energy blasts.

"I agree. Not much good having power if you literally can't hit the target," Ex-Aid chuckled as well, grabbing a couple of Muscular power ups and sending Gatton flying back with a hit to the chest.

"Let's not prolong this," Brave said as the four of them lined up, and were just about to reach for their Gashats when…

All four of them were suddenly sent flying into the ground as they felt an attack hit them in the back, causing sparks to fly off their armors.

As they attempted to get back up after the surprise attack, they saw their attacker "Graphite…" Ex-Aid growled as he saw the dragonic Bugster.

"I'm surprised you'd show your face around these parts again." Lazer said.

Graphite scoffed "I couldn't care less about your opinion. Besides… I'm stronger than you are now."

As he said that, Snipe finally got his visor working properly, and his eyes narrowed when he saw Graphite's level "He's leveled up, he's LV 7 now."

"Okay...that might be a problem," Ex-Aid frowned.

"Yeah, sure four of us makes a level 8, but that's not exactly helping unless we all hit him at the same time," Lazer agreed.

Graphite turned to Gatton, and slapped his back, causing Gatton to suddenly stiffen, before his eyes lit up and when he moved...he was now moving more like a normal person. "A little something from Leader. Now get going," Graphite said, shoving Gatton who soon took off...towards Beacon castle, the remaining Grunts following.

"Hold it!" Brave tried to stop them, but Graphite soon got in the way.

"I'm your opponent now," he glared.

"We don't have time for you." Snipe growled.

"Too bad, you'll have to make time." Graphite shot back and readied his weapon.

"No choice I guess. Everyone, we'll have to play smart if we want a chance to win," Ex-Aid frowned.

"Right, don't take unnecessary risks, and use Power Up Items whenever you can," Brave nodded in agreement.

"Like I'll make it THAT simple!" Graphite roared, before energy gathered at his weapon. "Dragon Fang of Rage!" he roared as the attack lashed out wildly, knocking them off their feet...and blowing away the nearby items.

"...okay, seriously considering a tactical retreat now," Lazer gulped a bit.

"I think we're all there with you," Snipe nodded.

"Like I'll let you!" Graphite growled, before lashing out with the energy blast again, knocking them back, and when they recovered, he was charging forward, his speed well beyond even Charlie from before, and managed to strike them all, causing sparks to fly from their armor as they were blown back.

"Okay, he's gonna be a problem," Ex-Aid groaned as they'd all been sent down to two-thirds of their health from just one attack.

"Well, doesn't look like we'll be able to get away that easily. Alright, Brave, give us some cover," Snipe said, earning a nod as Brave switched his sword to Ice mode and stabbed the ground, creating a large wall of ice.

"Like that's going to stop me!" Graphite growled as he destroyed the wall. However…

"Gotcha!" Ex-Aid and Lazer said together, the yellow rider back in bike form as Ex-Aid rode on his back, with their gashats in the Kimewaza slots " **MIGHTY/BAKUSOU CRITICAL STRIKE!"** with Ex-Aid lashing out with a kick while making Lazer's body spin, the back wheel and the foot striking Graphite at the same time.

Graphite grunted at the impact, getting pushed back a bit, before lashing out and knocking the two aside with a shout...right before he heard another thing. " **BANG BANG CRITICAL STRIKE!"**

"Say 'ah', dirt bag," Snipe smirked, before opening fire, making sure the rounds were the explosive ammo, causing the blast to fly through the air, and hit Graphite square in the chest, causing a massive explosion, causing the Bugster to shout in pain.

"And for the finishing touch!" Brave added as he switched his sword to Lightning mode, and slotted his Gashat in. " **TADDLE CRITICAL STRIKE!"** With that, Brave channeled his semblance into his sword, and swung it, creating a shockwave...which appeared right in front of the still reeling Graphite, and hit him dead on, causing another explosion.

"Did we get him?" Ex-Aid asked hopefully as the four regrouped. They soon got their answer.

"Dragon Fang of Rage!" Graphite roared as a massive red X flew out of the smoke, and hit the four of them dead on, causing their armor to short circuit as they were thrown back and forced out of their transformation. However, at the same time, the smoke cleared...and they could see Graphite who's body looked like it was glitching out. "You fought well, but not good enough. Fortunately for you, I'll be retreating this time," he growled, before vanishing in a mass of pixels.

"Not our best moment, but considering we beat him to a draw when in canon he kicked everyone's butts...I'd say we did pretty good," Retsu managed a weak grin.

"How come? The originals probably had more experience than us." Edler asked.

"They were shit when it came to working together." was Retsu's dry answer.

"...shit as in they just didn't work well together? Or shit as in they were as much at each other's throats?" Ai couldn't help but ask.

"Bit of column A, bit of column B." Retsu answered with a sigh.

"...VERY glad we don't have that problem," the other three said in unison. If they had been fighting among themselves, they'd have been curb stomped for sure.

"At any rate, we'd better go after Gatton," Natt said as he dusted himself off.

"Well...does the Stage Select take us back to CR?" Ai asked.

"No need," came Spring's voice through Edler's Game Scope.

"Let me guess, your dad had something for this?" Edler deadpanned.

"Bingo," Spring grinned.

"...is it gonna make us want to kill more?" Retsu asked with a tone as dry as a desert.

"Fortunately not this time. Emergency Recall!" Spring said, and suddenly the four of them vanished in pixels...and found themselves back in CR.

"Are you guys alright?" Spring asked as she went up to them and helped them up.

"We'll be fine, we just got caught by surprise." Natt told her.

"What exactly happened out there though? I couldn't pick up everything because of interference." she asked curiously.

"Graphite showed up and kicked out asses, he also gave Gatton a chance to escape from us." Retsu explained with a groan as he stretched out his body considering he felt sore all over.

"Are you all alright?" Spring asked in alarm. "And by that I mean, besides the obvious," she quickly added.

"Considering we still managed to beat him till he had to retreat? I'd say we did okay," Ai shrugged. "And he was level 7 too."

"Impressive. You're all getting very good at this," Spring smiled. "At any rate, do you know where Gatton is headed?" she asked.

"Oh right. He was headed...for Beacon…" Natt trailed off...right before an explosion was heard.

"Correction. He IS at Beacon," Edler said flatly.

* * *

"Why are there so many of them?!" Jaune asked as he held back a Bugster grunt with his shield, before starting to shield bash it in the head a few times and slash at it, sighing in relief when it faded into pixels.

"It might be related to the fact they're sowing chaos for the most part." Ren said as he shot at a few of them from afar.

"The more the merrier!" Nora added as she sent a few more Bugster flying with her hammer.

"That certainly seems to be the mentality they went with." Pyrrha added as she was making liberal use of her semblance thanks to the Bugster all wearing metal armor.

"Do you think they might have come from Professor Goodwitch?" Weiss frowned as she took out a few more Bugsters with a well placed ice blast.

"Considering they're tearing up the school...I'd say that's a good way to stress her out," Blake frowned as she gunned down another set of Bugsters.

"Not gonna let that happen!" Yang growled, blowing a Bugster's head off. "Though where'd the boys go?"

"They were trying to operate last I checked, maybe something went wrong. Either way, we'll just have to hold the fort till they get back!" Ruby said.

"Resistance is futile," came a new voice, as Gatton stepped into view.

"...gonna take a guess and say THAT is the main Bugster," Weiss said flatly.

"It was pretty obvious," Blake nodded.

"Hey, isn't that Gatton?" Ruby blinked.

"Yeah, you're right. Guess the boss this time is the last boss from Gekitotsu Robots," Yang said. "Careful, he's not gonna go down easy."

"When do these things ever go down easy?" Blake said flatly, right before they were forced to dodge as Gatton fired shots at them.

"Get ready girls, we're about to fight a Bugster!" Ruby said, readying Crescent Rose as team RWBY got ready to fight.

...or they would have, if not for Gatton suddenly taking an explosive shot to the back. "That's quite enough of messing up the school," Snipe said, as it turned out he had shot Gatton, the full team SBLE gathered and in level 2.

"Impossible! You were fighting Graphite!" Gatton gasped. "You should be pixel fragments by now!"

"We kicked his butt," Lazer said simply.

"And now that's what we're gonna turn YOU into. Pixel fragments," Ex-Aid added.

"Something you'll be able to do more easily real soon," Spring's voice suddenly said from their HUDs.

"What do you mean?" Ex-Aid asked.

"We literally JUST finished fine tuning this one," she said, before in Ex-Aid's side pocket, a new Gashat materialized.

"This is…" Ex-Aid blinked before taking out the Gashat, and seeing which game it was. "Gekitotsu Robots," he said, not the least bit surprised, before a grin formed. "You're in trouble now," he said before pushing the button on it down " **GEKITOTSU ROBOTS!"** and closing his driver up before putting the Gashat into the second slot, winding his arm up "Dai, Dai, Dai Henshin!" and then opening the driver back up " **GACHAN! LEVEL UP!"** as a red robot finally materialized from the fading screen, being best described as a chibi fighting robot.

" **MIGHTY JUMP! MIGHTY KICK! MIGHTY MIGHTY ACTION X! AGACHA! BUTTOBASE! TOTSUGEKI! GEKITOTSU PUNCH! GE-KI-TOT-SU ROBOTS!"**

The robot floated around Ex-Aid before splitting open above him at the jaw and lowering itself down, it's feet becoming shoulder armor while it's lower body became a chest plate to cover up the Rider Gauges, the head covering up his back, while the two arms attached together over Ex-Aid left arm as a large robotic gauntlet, a red piece shooting up from the armor and attaching itself around his helmet, framing the face and sporting a golden V on the forehead.

"Kamen Rider Ex-Aid, Level 3," Ex-Aid grinned.

"You're still 2 levels lower than me," Gatton said as he launched his claw at Ex-Aid...only for the Rider to knock it aside.

"Maybe, but this game is the best to take you out," Ex-Aid smirked, before charging forward, the heavy armor slowing him down a bit, but that didn't make a difference when his opponent wasn't very fast either, and landed a strong right to his head, knocking him back.

"So Gashats really are the most effective against Bugsters that come from the same game," Brave mused.

"Let's give him a hand," Lazer started, but Snipe stopped him.

"Wait. Considering the goal is to increase Professor Goodwitch's stress, it's likely that the goal is to damage Beacon further," Snipe said.

"That's a good point. Ex-Aid, how are you holding up against him?" Brave checked, earning a thumbs up from Ex-Aid who'd just punched Gatton again.

"Alright then, we'll deal with the Grunts through the castle. You take out the boss," Lazer said, understanding the plan.

"Alright, everyone, assist the rest of the castle," Snipe commanded as he moved towards another hall.

"Wait, what about Retsu?" Ruby asked.

"You DO realize he's Super Gamer R, right?" Lazer chuckled. "If anyone knows how to pull a game's abilities to the max, it's him. We'd be better off routing out the remaining Grunts."

"He...does make a good point," Blake said.

"And it's not like we can actually harm a Bugster," Weiss agreed.

"Guess we'll help with the rest of the castle," Yang nodded.

Ruby seemed unsure, but nodded all the same. "Okay then, good luck Retsu, we'll take care of the Grunts for you!" she said, earning a thumbs up from the Rider who was locked in a fight with Gatton.

Once they were all gone. "Now it's just you and me. Let's end this as soon as we can," Ex-Aid said.

"Very well, I will make your end swift," Gatton said, before the two began duking it out, heavy fists impacting thick armor, sending sparks flying everywhere, while the two fought for dominance. At first things seemed fairly balanced...until Ex-Aid ducked under a swing, and knocked Gatton off his feet, followed by a strong hook to the chest, sending him tumbling back.

"Time to clear the game," Ex-Aid smirked before taking out the Gekitotsu Robots Gashat and inserting it into the Kimewaza Slot, pushing down on the button " **KIMEWAZA!"** and rearing his armored hand back as the energy travelled into it, before he pushed the button down again " **GEKITOTSU CRITICAL STRIKE!"** and then threw his arm forward, the gauntlet rocketing off his arm and flying into Gatton, colliding with his chest and pushing him back till he hit a wall, while Ex-Aid ran ahead, and punched his fist back into the gauntlet, driving it further into Gatton… and causing him to explode.

" **GAME CLEAR!"**

Ex-Aid sighed in relief when he heard the announcement, watching as some scattered grunt Bugsters started fading away slowly. Beacon was safe once more.

* * *

"These Bugsters are certainly...troublesome," Glynda sighed as she had now been confirmed to be cured. After hearing what had happened, she could only sigh in annoyance. "Well, I'd better get going. Thank you again for all your help."

"Actually, Professor Ozpin left a message. He says he wants you to take a few days off," Spring spoke up.

Glynda blinked in surprise. "Are you sure? What about the school?"

"Oh don't worry, Professor Ozpin said he found a few...temporary replacements," Spring chuckled.

* * *

"Remind me again why we're the ones stuck cleaning this mess up?" a random second year, specifically one of the ones who'd been causing trouble this week, said in annoyance. "We didn't even make the mess this time!"

"Cause it's BECAUSE of our messes that that monster appeared," another groaned.

"At least we aren't THOSE guys." a third year student said, inclining his head to the left and making everyone glance there, seeing team CRDL having to fix one of the broken arches, which wouldn't be so bad… except Dr. Oobleck was the one overseeing them, and was VERY meticulous.

Suffice to say, none of the troublemakers were in the mood to cause problems anytime soon.

* * *

 **And there's the chapter!**

 **The return of Graphite, and the guys have managed to land some proper damage on him.**

 **And the debut of Gekitotsu Robots, a pretty neat form for so early in the series.**

 **Sorry the chapter was so short, but it's not easy to come up with lots of content all the time since this is still between the first day and Jaunedice.**

 **Anyway, see ya next time!**


	15. Level 10

**Welcome back everyone, to another Gamer Hunters after a little while.**

 **To compensate, we made the chapter... pretty much huge honestly.**

 **Hope you'll enjoy!**

* * *

"So the first of the Level 3 Gashats showed no abnormalities or problems. Good," Chroma nodded as he went over the data of the recent battle. After a moment he turned to another screen and went over the other Gashats he was working on. Currently, his main focus was on the Doremifa Beat Gashat, but he also had data on others such as Giri Giri Chanbara, Jet Combat, Juju Burger, and a few more. Additionally, he also had a tab dealing with something called 'DZ', marked at 50%. "And the last one still needs….time," he mused. Still, things were progressing well so far. The boys were doing well, and so far the Bugsters had been kept in check. Still though, their current equipment could only last for so long. He had to get these upgrades done soon. Especially THAT one. "Something's missing from it though, I can already tell… but what?"

* * *

Meanwhile, it was another typical day in Beacon. "Huh, it's already been a week since the last Bugster showed up," Retsu mused.

"It's a good thing, seeing as we'd rather NOT have them show up every day," Natt said.

"The only problem….makes things kinda...boring," Ai sighed.

"I suppose it can't be helped. Side effect of living a double life," Edler mused. It didn't help next was the one class they ALL didn't like. Port's class.

Along the way to the class though, they came across a...disturbingly common sight. "Again?" Natt growled, as they came upon team CRDL once again ganging up on one of the other students. Unsurprisingly, it was one of the faunus students, cause by now they'd realized just how big of a bigot that jackass is.

"This again?" Retsu growled, hair turning orange, but soon turned teal again. "Give me a minute."

"You get five," Natt said flatly. By now all of them were so sick of seeing the arrogant young man act like he owned the school when he wasn't anywhere near the top hunter, and generally acting like a total douche.

A couple of minutes later, and team CRDL were popsicles, courtesy of Retsu's Semblance.

"Thanks for the save," the student in question a male cat faunus, evident by the tail, sighed. "You guys are those new Kamen Riders, aren't you?" he blinked after realizing who just saved him.

"That's us," Ai nodded with a small grin, before he frowned. "Those dopes giving you a lot of trouble?"

"Not just me. They pretty much just act like they can get away with whatever they want, and they're always going after anyone they think can't fight back. Oh, I forgot to introduce myself. I'm Felix. Felix Nava," he introduced himself.

The four of them sweat dropped a bit at the name, but ultimately accepted it. "Anyway, we'd better get going. Be careful with people like these morons running around," Retsu said.

"It might be wise to have your teammates with you. These four usually don't do anything unless they're pretty sure they can win," Edler added.

"Right, I'll keep that in mind. Thanks," Felix nodded, before going for his class. With that done, the four looked at the frozen idiots.

"I doubt that thought you idiots a lesson, but… just know that the more you do this, the more I want to find a rocket, stuff you four in it, and see how far you go before aliens grab you and probe you, maybe see if they stick you in a box canyon to see what you morons do." Retsu said, looking at the four frozen morons in deadpan.

"I don't know what's worse. That those morons never learn...or that they actually can get away with this shit," Ai frowned.

"Yeah, now that you mention it...isn't this school kind of….understaffed?" Natt mused.

"And yet they somehow keep it running," Edler shrugged….until he realized something. "We've got 2 minutes till class starts."

"...run for it before Ms. Goodwitch catches us!" Ai shouted, the group making a mad dash for the classroom.

* * *

Several hours later (and one boring as heck lecture), the teams were gathered in the next class, which was Combat Class.

And already a match was going on, this time, it was Cardin against Jaune… and Cardin was (sadly) winning.

Though Jaune had put up a good effort so far, while his aura WAS in the yellow, he had managed to chip away at least a third of Cardin's own aura.

If Jaune were to be perfectly honest, it was likely he never would have been able to do that without Edler's little tips when they had their own match a while back. Unfortunately, as he'd already somewhat inwardly accepted, while that was an improvement from his initial performance…

The mace found its way against his chest, sending his aura down to the red.

...he still had a LONG way to go before he would be ready for anything OTHER than practice fights.

"That's enough," Glynda said, calling the match. With that she gave comments on both fighters, while also giving tips, namely telling Cardin that while his strength is a good asset, he needs to use more variety, while Jaune she recommended to refer to his scroll more to better gauge his aura. With that done, they moved on to the second match, with the first student selected being...Yang. "Now then Ms. Xiao Long, please choose who you'd like to fight."

Yang perked up when she saw she was chosen, before looking through her classmates with a hum, wondering who to fight.

Eventually, her eyes fell on her opponent, grinning a bit "Hey, Retsu! Wanna fight me?"

Retsu looked up at her at that, looking down to the arena, before shrugging "Sure, might be fun." he said with a slight smile as he pulled his hood up and went down to the arena with her.

"You both know the rules. Tournament style combat only," Glynda said, earning a nod from both of them. She barely finished giving out the signal, when Yang suddenly surged forward. She'd seen what Retsu could do before, and she knew the best way to fight someone like him was to not give him room to breath.

Retsu for his part was almost taken off guard, fortunately the training and his own quick reflexes meant he caught the movement...but he was a little bit slower, meaning he had no choice.

Yang's fist met empty air, causing her to stumble a bit, but quickly turned to see Retsu in the air...now sporting a pair of tanuki ears and a tail. "Seriously? The Tanuki Leaf too?" Yang blinked, recognizing the power up from Mario...adapted into its Super Smash Brothers version, evident by the tail wiggling as Retsu floated in the air, rather than going up high and gently coming down.

"Yeah, I pretty much got all of the power ups," Retsu smirked, though inwardly he knew he had to do this quick. With that in mind, he stopped floating...and came down on her with his hammer.

Yang quickly evaded, and quickly tried to retaliate, the two of them soon falling into a rhythm of attacking and evading, as Retsu had better mobility, but Yang had better power. Yet at the same time, neither of them were overly weak in the other area, thus creating a brief stalemate...one that ended when the ears and tail vanished from Retsu's body.

"Time limit…" Retsu growled, now being forced on the defensive, using his hammer to score hits where he could, but as it was, at the rate things were going, he'd be losing more of his aura by the time his power recharged. "Guess this isn't such a great match up for me."

Yang grinned "Well, I guess that means I win."

"Nah, I just needed you to give me a few seconds to test something," Retsu chuckled, before he surged forward.

Yang quickly moved to defend...and promptly felt a mass of steel plow into her, sending her back. "Cheap trick!" Yang gasped.

"Turning metal right before I hit something makes for a good battering ram," Retsu smirked...right before he got sent back with a strong punch, Yang looking like she was literally on fire.

"Well how about I melt all that right off then?" Yang said with a grin. As she said that, Retsu returned to normal, seemingly deactivating his semblance, and for a second she wondered if he actually WAS going to give up, until…

"Yare yare daze…" Retsu sighed in annoyance, getting up. "Guess I'll have to step up a bit," he said as he turned to her, and she noticed bits of his hair that were visible had turned orange. However, what really caught Yang's attention was when several gasps were heard, and she turned to see what they were looking at, just in time to see the gauge displaying their Aura...with Retsu's gauge suddenly filling up to full.

"What the hell?!" she said in shock, before turning to him "What are you doing?!"

She could feel him raise an eyebrow, before looking at the screen, and then turning back to her, shrugging "It's just something I do."

"So… do you guys know what just happened?" Ruby asked in the seats as she looked to the rest of team SBLE.

"Honestly? No. I have no idea." Natt said, looking at the screen in confusion.

"With what little study I've done up on aura, I know that realistically, his aura suddenly recharging would be impossible, so this… I don't know what's going on." Edler admitted.

He wasn't the only one who thought that, as Glynda was looking at the arena with a frown. She had no idea how Retsu had done what he did, but as it was, there was no sign of foul play and the equipment seemed to be working correctly, so she couldn't exactly call off the match…

"Well whatever, let's get this done," Retsu shrugged, before revealing his weapon which had turned into its sword mode, and suddenly surged forward. Yang quickly reacted, throwing a punch, only for Retsu to jump over her, but this time she was ready, and followed up with a blast from her gauntlets...only for Retsu to suddenly double jump in mid-air, avoiding her attack.

The fight soon shifted, as Yang suddenly found that Retsu was somehow evading and dodging all her moves by use of various video game moves like the double jump and power slide, and heck, she swore Retsu wasn't THIS acrobatic before. The surprises kept coming when out of a double jump, Retsu air dashed right into her, slashing her with his sword, getting to the ground, and rebounding with another dash, catching her in the side, and chipping away at more of her aura.

Yang growled, her semblance activating as she aimed for a punch at him, and with the distance, he wouldn't be able to evade...only he did, as it almost felt like he sped up at the very last moment, and something akin to a pulse was felt before he evaded out of the way, her fist missing him just BARELY, before he got to her side and slashed her again, sending her tumbling away. She barely had time to get up as he pressed his advantage, attacking and evading in a way that didn't need him to break off his assault till finally…

"That's enough," Glynda said, as by now Yang's aura had fallen into the red from where Retsu had been chipping away at it even when she'd been able to defend. "A rather impressive come back, Mr. Plaiy," Glynda said, before frowning a little. "Might I ask how you managed it?" she asked, and everyone in the room could tell what she was referring to.

Retsu looked around a bit, seeing all eyes on him, bringing out a small "Mendokusei." from him… not that she had anyway to know what that meant, but judging by his annoyed look at the class, it wasn't happy.

He then turned back to her "I'd prefer to speak of this in private please, it's a personal matter."

* * *

Several hours later, and Team SBLE were gathered in their dorm room. Earlier, after class, the team had understandably confronted Retsu on the matter. Retsu sighed, and after a bit of coaxing, told them the truth, the same one he'd told Glynda. When he was done…

"Damn...I knew you had a secret up your sleeve, but not one of those situations," Ai blinked.

"It certainly is...rare…" Edler nodded.

"And I can imagine not something you really like to advertise...though it WOULD explain the aura recharge," Natt mused.

"Yeah, so PLEASE keep it under your hat guys, I'd like to make sure this stays between us unless it really needs to be addressed… besides, some people would certainly whine about it being unfair." Retsu explained, before sighing in annoyance at the end.

* * *

The next day came like any other day. Wake up, go to class, then break in between. Of course, it wouldn't be a normal day without SOMETHING going on. Case in point…

"Really? Does anything go through that head of his?" Natt said in exasperation, as once again team CRDL was busy showing their 'superiority' by being neanderthal bullies. 'Bonus points' being that the victim was Felix...when that went SOOO well the previous day.

"Ok, you know what? This is just getting stupid." Retsu said, before they heard what sounded like a revving noise and suddenly he blurred, kicking all four members of team CRDL in the ass and bringing Felix closer to them "Speed shoes." he said to the questioning stares.

"That Semblance of yours is really broken," was all Felix could say.

"But still useful," Retsu grinned.

"For now, let's get out of here before those four finally grow a brain and figure out what's going on," Edler sight in annoyance, to which they did.

"Thanks again for the save," Felix sighed, reaching into his pockets, only to blink in confusion as he moved his hands around in them, his face growing more and more distressed "Where… where is it?!"

"What's wrong? Did you lose something?" Ai blinked in surprise.

"The charm! The lucky charm my brother gave me!" Felix was almost hysterical by then.

"Where did you last see it?" Natt asked, hoping to try and calm the frantic faunus.

"I had it with me before...right before…." he trailed off before his eyes narrowed in anger. "Them...they must have taken it or caused me to drop it…!" he snarled.

"God dammit those assholes are really acting like a bunch of proper cunts right now." Retsu growled.

"This is really entering illegal territory, even for them." Edler added in anger.

"We should report this to the faculty," Natt growled as well.

"...don't bother," Felix suddenly sighed as if the energy he had evaporated. "Not like this is the first time something like this has happened…"

"Come on now, don't say that," Ai said, hoping to help. "I mean, I'm sure if we explain…"

"What's there to explain?!" Felix shouted. "You think those four are the first? There are lots of people like them, and nobody is lifting a finger to do anything, not even the teachers!" he shouted. "That's just how things are...nobody cares...I wish there were more people like you four, maybe then things might actually start getting better…" he seemed so tired by now, and as if things couldn't get worse...a familiar static started to appear over his body.

"Shit!" Ai swore as he saw the static.

Edler didn't waste time in using his game scope on Felix, and the result was "This is… a new Bugster."

"I don't even know this one, but judging by the music note, it's for Doremifa Beat." Retsu noted.

"We'll worry about exactly which Bugster emerges from that strain later. For now we need to get him to CR," Natt said, to which they quickly brought him to the elevator.

* * *

"The patient is one Felix Nava, age 17, Faunus: cat. So the cause of stress was a build up due to continued discrimination, with the loss of an important gift being the breaking point," Spring frowned, looking over the charts. "Honestly, why do people keep doing these things, especially when they cause more outbreaks than any other kind of trigger," she sighed.

"If we knew, we'd tell you," Edler sighed. "Anyway, it seems the strain we're dealing with is that of Doremifa Beat."

"That's your game isn't it?" Ai mused, before gaining a mischievous smirk. "Does that mean you're the Bugster we have to deal with?"

"Of course not!" Spring shouted, smacking him upside the head.

"ANYway, we should begin the operation immediately. As it is, the outbreak may happen anytime," Edler sighed, pulling the situation back on track.

"The strain comes from Doremifa Beat, so odds are we'll be dealing with a rhythm based ability," Natt sighed.

"No problem, leave the rhythm games to me," Retsu grinned, as they entered the operation room. "Don't worry Felix, we promise we'll make this better, THEN we'll get your lucky charm back."

"Yeah… thanks guys. I guess the virus DOES take priority so I don't die." Felix said, laughing awkwardly.

"Don't worry, everything will be fine." Edler reassured him, before they all strapped one the drivers and activated their gashats "Henshin!"

In response to their transformation, Felix winced as his body was covered completely by the pixels, which formed up into the usual orange mass.

"Let's take this someplace else." Lazer said as he pressed the stage select button, bringing them all out to…

"Is this an opera house?" Ex-Aid asked as he looked around.

"I… think so yeah." Snipe said, honestly thrown for a loop.

"Well… fitting in that case." Brave said as the Bugster Union finished forming, revealing itself as a giant treble clef.

"Okay, these Unions are waaay too on the nose," Lazer couldn't help but say, before they didn't waste time and began attacking. In retaliation, the Union released shockwaves of sound at the group, forcing them back when it hit them.

"Let's not waste time," Snipe frowned, opening fire again, using his explosive ammo to cause additional damage.

In retaliation, the Union looked ready to fire another blast, but Brave was faster, creating a wall of ice around the Union, dampening out the soundwave, causing the wall to break, but leaving it open to Ex-Aid and Lazer who quickly came in and started attacking the exposed Union, scoring hit after hit as they rebounded off of the blocks that appeared.

"Let's bring it down!" Ex-Aid shouted, earning several nods as Lazer got next to Snipe and they charged up their weapons, before firing, hitting the Union dead on, while Ex-Aid rebounded, turning his hammer into its sword mode, Brave running forward with his flame sword, before they made a pass and struck the Union at the same time, causing massive damage and making it break down.

Once the actual Bugsters finished forming, the grunts could best be described as ravers, concert goers, basically, music fans, dressed in merchandise and waving around glow sticks.

For the leading Bugster though, he was dressed in an open yellow hoodie with several pieces of 'bling' on his hands and a heavy looking necklace of gold chain around his neck, what looked like a stylised gas mask on his face with pink lens over where his eyes would be, a pair of headphones, and… well, a pretty big mohawk honestly.

"Hey hey! Let's start this concert with track number 5!" the Bugster announced loudly, the grunts cheering him on.

"Okay...who's this guy?" Lazer blinked.

"That's DJ Scratch. About the closest thing to a final boss Doremifa Beat has," Ex-Aid said.

"So wait...we're up against a boss who's fighting abilities are basically 0, right?" Snipe checked.

"Other than maybe making us play Rhythm games….yeah?" Ex-Aid shrugged.

There was a bit of a long silence in the group, eventually broken by Lazer "Well… don't know if I should be insulted or relieved."

"It's an iffy area sometimes." Brave said.

"Hey hey hey! Don't go talking like I'm not here yo!" DJ Scratch said indignantly.

"Oh god, he even has that kind of speech tick," Lazer couldn't help but say.

"Let's just get this over with," Snipe grumbled, opening fire...to which the Grunts got in the way, several of them getting destroyed.

"Hey hey hey! Don't go attacking the star just like that yo! You gotta EARN the right to face me first! Let's party!" DJ Scratch called out, before suddenly an instrumental version of the song 'Excite' started playing while he sent a series of symbols in the shapes of a triangles, circles, squares, and Xs floating towards them.

"Are we really doing this?" Brave groaned.

"We might get a penalty if we fail this, so roll with it," Ex-Aid deadpanned. With that...the four of them began dancing to the tune, following the indicators and before long, they'd all cleared the mini-game with varying points, but overall everyone cleared it without too much issue. Once it was done...everyone promptly leveled up and tore through the Grunts, before focusing on DJ Scratch.

"This is officially the most annoying operation we've done," Snipe sighed. Honestly this really was annoying.

"Heh, not bad, you got past my mad song and my fans," DJ Scratch smirked. "But now time for my BEST move."

"This guy really isn't giving up, is he? Lazer groaned.

"Come on Wall of Sound yo!" DJ Scratch called out as he spun a disk from...somewhere and suddenly they were all blown back by a massive burst of sound.

"...okay, that was different…" Ex-Aid blinked as they got up. They didn't take TOO much damage, but that was still...surprising.

"Rather loud isn't he?" Brave said, shaking his head a bit.

"You think that's loud, try this!" DJ Scratch laughed, as he turned up the volume to 11...and blasted them across the area with another soundwave.

"Oookay, this might actually be a problem," Lazer groaned.

"Let's try this!" Ex-Aid said, grabbing a couple of power ups. " **MUSCLE! METAL!"**

"That ain't gonna be enough to stop my song!" DJ Scratch laughed, firing another blast, hitting the powered up Ex-Aid head on, pushing him back, before sending him flying, the power ups vanishing when he landed on the ground.

"Guess power ups aren't good enough," Snipe frowned. "Perhaps one of us should try using Gekitotsu."

"That won't be necessary." the voice of Chroma called into their helmets.

"And why is that?" Brave asked the CEO with a groan, before looking down at his belt as something down there glowed and a greenish-yellow gashat materialised in his holder.

"Because Doremifa Beat is finished." They could practically hear Chroma's grin as he answered.

"I suppose it makes sense to beat a Bugster with the game it came from," Brave mused, taking out the Gashatt and activating it. " **DOREMIFA BEAT!"** With the Gashatt activated, the screen appeared behind him, and from it, a small yellow robot flew out with a red visor over it's eyes, looking a bit like a hip DJ. Brave then closed the lever on his Gamer Driver, and inserted the new Gashatt into the secondary slot, "Skill Level 3." before opening it again.

" **GACHAN! LEVEL UP! TADDLE MEGURU! TADDLE MEGURU! TADDLE QUEST! A GACHA! DO-DO-DOREMIFA-SO-LA-TI-DO! (YEAH! YEAH!) OK! DOREMIFA (THIS IS THE BEAT THEY ASK FOR) BEA~T! (TO THE BEAT! TO THE BEAT!)"**

The robot split open across the middle before seemingly swallowing Brave's upper body, converting itself into a metallic yellow torso armor with a set of speakers on his left shoulder, a miniature scratch table on his right forearm, and his helmet now sporting a pair of pink glasses over the eyes, the front of a cap, and a headset.

"Alright, now we should be able to make some progress," Lazer grinned under his helmet.

"Hey hey hey! No stealing my style!" DJ Scratch shouted, firing another wave of sound. However, this time Brave could see something else in his vision, the sounds became visible and points started to highlight as they came closer. Readying his sword, he activated his semblance and struck at the points in the correct rhythm, causing the entire wall to collapse. "What the heck?!" DJ Scratch gasped. However, Brave surged forward, and began striking at him several times, once again matching the rhythm, each blow causing more and more damage, ending with a strong strike to the chest, sending him barreling back.

"Let's not prolong this," Brave sighed, taking out the Doremifa Beat Gashatt and inserting it into his Gashacon Saber. " **GASHATTO! DOREMIFA...CRITICAL FINISH!**

At that, the HUD in Brave's helmet showed what appeared to be a grid, with the focus being on DJ Scratch. Running forward, his blade became covered in musical notes, before he struck at DJ Scratch, followed by another and another and another, following the rhythm of the HUD, while each strike released a series of sounds that with the rhythm soon became that of an instrumental song.

"Oh hey, that's the first battle theme from Tales of Vesperia." Ex-Aid blinked under his helmet.

"Chroma puts the weirdest things into these doesn't he?" Snipe deadpanned.

Back with the finisher, Brave finished it with one last strike, scoring a 'Perfect'. "Shows over!" DJ Scratch shouted before he fell back and exploded.

"Operation complete," Brave said simply.

"Alright, now that we've handled the Bugster… time to go and kick Cardin's ass again." Lazer said, cracking his knuckles a bit with a smirk beneath his helmet.

* * *

Later, the group returned to the CR, with Felix now sitting upright, looking up at them hopefully, and grinning when they held up a bullet casing "This it then?"

"Yeah… something from my older brother. He was a huntsman." Felix said as he accepted the bullet casing, smiling fondly.

"I'm sure he's proud of you." Edler told him with a smile.

Felix nodded in thanks "Yeah… thanks a lot guys."

"No problem. It was our pleasure. Really it was," Ai smirked, cracking his knuckles a bit. Meanwhile several students noted a certain four who were out cold with a black eye each...and walked away without bothering to help.

* * *

A week passed after that, and so far things had been peaceful. "So...a field trip to Forever Falls...guess that'd be fun," Ai shrugged.

"Remnant does have some rather interesting sights," Natt mused, remembering his own travels.

"Still, this being Remnant, we should be careful. There are Grimm as usual in those areas," Edler reminded.

"As long as we don't get cocky we should be fine," Retsu shrugged.

"By the way… you've all heard how Jaune has been acting… weird recently, yeah?" Ai asked them.

"Yeah… for some reason he's been hanging out with Cardin." Natt frowned.

"That makes no sense though, why would he hand around that jerkass?" Retsu frowned.

"Well… chances are… what if Jaune's being blackmailed with something?" Edler suggested.

"Huh… well… Cardin DOES target Jaune a lot… would make sense for him to try and blackmail the poor guy." Natt mused.

"Does that guy EVER learn?" Retsu grumbled.

"They have a flatline for a learning curve," Ai deadpanned.

"And here I thought THAT was supposed to be impossible," Natt sighed with an annoyed shake of his head. "Well, let's find out what it is and make Cardin stop...again."

"This is getting really old really fast," Ai groaned.

"Let's try and find Jaune, maybe we can convince him to let us help." Retsu said, the others nodding as they went out of the dorm to try and find the blonde dork.

While searching for Jaune, they ended up finding someone else however.

"Hey Pyrrha… something wrong?" Retsu asked, frowning when he noticed Pyrrha looking down, literally not metaphorically.

"Oh, hey guys," Pyrrha sighed. "And no...nothing's really wrong with me anyway."

"But something IS wrong, isn't it?" Edler frowned.

"Well...I guess Jaune's been having me worried lately, and I just don't know why he won't say anything," Pyrrha said with a tired sigh, and a notable touch of irritation. "Its like he thinks he has to do it all by himself."

"What EXACTLY is going on? We kinda pieced together that he's probably being blackmailed by Cardin since he's always hanging out with him." Ai asked in concern.

Pyrrha looked up in surprise "Blackmail… oh no! Cardin heard Jaune then!"

"What are you talking about?" Natt asked her, confused.

"It's… well… it's personal to Jaune, so I can't tell you, but I can at least say it's perfect blackmail material for Cardin to use." Pyrrha explained.

"Well that complicates things…" Ai frowned. "On one hand we can't ASK you to tell us what it is, and we can't find a solution either without knowing what it is…"

"It's like a puzzle without knowing what the solution looks like," Retsu agreed.

"Guess the only way we'll have any clues is to ask him directly," Edler frowned. "Do you know where we might be able to find him?"

"Well… either over by team CRDL's dorm room… or over on the roof." Pyrrha said, before sighing "I hope he'll listen to you four at least."

"Thanks. We'll see if we can do something about this," Natt nodded. With that, the four of them split up into two groups, one to check the dorm and another to check on the roof. The ones checking the Dorm were Natt and Ai, while the ones checking the roof were Retsu and Edler.

Fortunately for the ease of movement, Jaune seemed to have picked now to be at the roof, where Retsu and Edler found him. "You look like someone kicked your favorite puppy," Retsu said, catching his attention.

"Huh? Oh… hey guys… what brought you here?" Jaune asked, confused.

Edler sighed, walking up to the blonde boy "Jaune… we know Cardin's blackmailing you."

"What?!" Jaune's eyes went wide at hearing that.

"It wasn't too hard to figure out when taking everything into account, we just don't know what he has over you." Retsu added, and Jaune's shoulders sagged a little.

"I… I see." Jaune said lowly.

"Jaune… are you willing to tell us?" Edler asked. "We won't force you but if you tell us we might be able to find a way to counter it."

"And by counter, we mean there are certain benefits from having Chroma as our sponsor," Retsu laughed, earning a small dope slap from Edler.

"I…" Jaune hesitated...before answering. "Its fine. I can handle this," he said.

"You don't have to act tough you know, I mean, there's nothing wrong with asking for help," Retsu prodded a bit.

"Not when I'm always the one asking for help!" Jaune snapped.

Edler sighed "Jaune, do you know how huntsmen get better?" he asked, seemingly out of left field.

Jaune blinked at the sudden question "They… train?" he answered, a little unsure.

"That. But they also get help when they need it, and are able to admit when they aren't able to do something on their own. When they have a team, they go to them with their problems. How do you think Pyrrha, your partner, feels, when you're avoiding her and not taking her help when she's clearly offering it?" Edler said.

Jaune frowned "Why would she want anything to do with me? I'm just… useless old Jaune… I don't even belong here."

"Come on now, you passed the entrance exam and the initiation, of course you belong here," Retsu said encouragingly. Too bad that wasn't going to give him the result he wanted.

"An exam I forged papers for and an initiation I was just getting dragged along for?!" Jaune shouted, and that turned out to be the straw that broke the camel's back as suddenly he doubled over, static covering his body.

"You were infected?!" Edler gasped in surprise, and from the reaction it was about to go on an Outbreak. True enough, the static covered Jaune's body, but instead of a Union, something else happened. The static covered him and transformed into a main body of a Bugster.

The Bugster in question had an orange armored body that was themed after a jet, a red visor serving for eyes, he had a turbine for a right arm, a missile launcher for a left arm, and a gatling gun on his right shoulder, a few pipes being visible on his body as well.

"Beginning mission 8." the Bugster spoke "Vernier, ready for take off."

"That's Vernier from Jet Combat," Retsu recognized.

"So we'll be up against some artillery then," Edler frowned as they strapped on their Gamer Drivers. However….

"Hold it!" Vernier said, and before their eyes, his body shifted, revealing Jaune...though his left arm was still transformed...and promptly pointed it at his own head.

"What?!" Retsu exclaimed in anger.

"I've been waiting years for him to build up enough stress for me to take him over, I won't let you Kamen Riders ruin everything so easily." Vernier spoke through Jaune's body "I'm willing however to take my losses and just wait out in another host… you, however, can't afford to lose, can you?" he added with a cruel grin.

"A Bugster that's developed enough to strategize," Edler cursed. This was going to be more complicated than usual.

"So what'll it be? I walk away, or does 'vomit boy' here have his brains splattered all over Beacon?" Vernier smirked.

The two riders glared daggers at Vernier...but removed their Gamer Drivers.

"Thought so," Vernier smirked, before transforming fully and taking off.

"This...just became a problem…" Retsu frowned.

* * *

"Well...that definitely complicates things," Chroma frowned as they were all currently gathered in CR. "I was aware that they'd likely evolve quickly since I stopped introducing the anti-virus, but I never thought it'd be THIS fast. Not to mention now that I think about it, I haven't heard from Vernier in quite some time…"

"So, since the last time you beat him, he resurfaced in Jaune and decided to just bide his time unlike all the others… I hate fighting smart opponents." Natt said in annoyance.

"To make matters worse, none of us can fly." Ai said with a groan.

"Actually… one of you can fly." Chroma said, before pulling out a Gashat from his pocket and putting it on the table, showing it to be an orange gashat that red JET COMBAT on the sticker. "The only problem is getting Vernier into a situation he can't just turn into Jaune and use him as a meat shield."

"If only we could lock him in that form…" Spring frowned.

"Hey, that might just work," Ai noted.

"True...if we introduce a program that locks Vernier in his Bugster form, we'll be able to destroy him without worrying about harming Jaune," Chroma agreed.

"Then I guess our goal for now is keeping track of Vernier while you make that program." Natt said as he took the gashat.

"Should we inform Pyrrha about what happened to her team leader?" Retsu asked with a frown.

Chroma frowned in thought "I think… it's best if you don't. Not until you've healed him at least. We don't want her doing something desperate. I'll make sure to inform Ozpin though."

"Probably a good idea," Edler sighed. None of them were too happy with this, but it was necessary. Sometimes fighting an enemy that literally manifested from stress...was a big issue...

Whatever the case they soon left CR, having to think of something they could do to fix the problem...hopefully without making it worse inadvertently.

* * *

Vernier sighed as he touched down on a roof in Vale, reverting to Jaune's body, though his normally blue eyes were red, a clear sign of him being possessed "That was close. I can't have those annoying riders ruin this for me."

"Well now, aren't you a sight for sore eyes?" a voice called out, making him turn to see Graphite and Tox, the former of the two smirking at him "It's been a few years since I last saw you Vernier."

Vernier grinned at them "Indeed it has Graphite, I decided to play the long game on this one rather than an immediate action, and so far it's been paying off, but of course, those pesky riders had to interfere."

"They ARE getting troublesome." Tox groused.

"Yes, I've seen them take down a few of our brethren already." Vernier frowned.

"Yeah, that's why I'm glad to see you my friend." Graphite said with a smile as he went and clapped Vernier's shoulder.

Vernier smiled back, before groaning "Dammit, this host is weak. I know I told the riders I can wait longer if I have to, but I've been doing this plan for years now, and resetting would be time consuming as all hell."

"So you need something to push your host to the limits of his stress so you can materialise." Tox summed up, humming in thought "Well, I'll ask the boss if he has suggestions for you, or maybe one of the other generals."

"The best would be Nin, aka, Mr.I-did-it-in-an-hour." Graphite scoffed "He REALLY likes to brag about that. Too bad he's got that deep cover mission of his in the White Fang."

"Either way, it's VERY fortunate that you're here Vernier, because you just made my job easier. I've been trying to drop off a little something at Beacon with… mild success, and it almost got discovered a few times. But with you here, I can have it placed in the one location where only the intended target will find it." Tox said, grinning as he brought out the Knockout Fighter gashat "So, think you're up for playing delivery boy for a bit?"

Vernier scoffed "Using my abilities for a mere delivery…" he said, sighing "But fine, I can do that much, where do you need me to put it?"

Tox's response was to grin as he went up to Vernier and whispered the location to him while handing over the Gashat.

Vernier blinked once, twice, before laughing loudly "Of all the places…"

* * *

"Okay...how to keep an eye for Jaune...without running into the rest of JNPR and having to answer difficult questions?" Retsu frowned.

"You got me. Hopefully with Chroma telling Ozpin they'll make an excuse for us," Ai sighed.

"I just hope nothing more annoying happens," Natt sighed. Too bad murphy was being a jerk today.

"Seriously?" Edler groaned, as coming down the hall...was team CRDL.

"I REALLY hope they don't open their mouths…" Retsu groaned.

Sadly, murphy didn't feel like granting them a break.

"Where do you think that dork ran off to? I still need him to make that essay for me." Russel groused in annoyance as he marched along, hands in his pockets.

"Don't know, but he'd better not have squealed to anyone, unless he wants to get kicked out of Beacon that is." Cardin snorted "Idiots like him are only good for one thing after all."

"You four really give the word 'bastard' a new meaning, you know that?" Ai snarled. "Do you listen to yourselves or do you believe the world revolves around you four and don't give a damn what your actions cause?"

"What are you asses talking about?" Dove asked with a sneer.

"Oh I dunno...how about how you dopes are literally responsible for 2 Bugster Outbreaks in a week that we're stuck cleaning up? How about the part where you dopes act like you're all that when you get your asses kicked on a near 100% basis? Or maybe the part where you four don't know the meaning of acting like a human if it bit you in the faces?!" Retsu growled, hair turning orange.

"Who cares about those stupid Bugsters? We'll just kick all their asses once we graduate." Sky waved off, not seeing the issue.

"...okay, that does it," Natt snarled, dialing up Chroma. However, before he could even say anything…

"I was watching from the gamescope. You four have full permission to use the Rider Gears on them. But please restrict it to level 1," Chroma said simply, followed by whispering "Ozpin was also listening, he said you'll get off lightly and don't have to worry too much."

"Thank you," Edler said...through gritted teeth. "Hey Cardin, remember how you thought Bugsters and Riders aren't a big deal? That you could deal with them?"

"Yeah? I still say I can," Cardin smirked...right before all four of SBLE strapped on their Gamer Drivers.

"It's your lucky day. You get to test that theory," Natt said maliciously.

The grins on the faces of team SBLE were positively DEMONIC when they activated their Gashatts.

* * *

"That felt so good words do not describe how good I feel right now," Retsu smirked as they took off the Gamer Drivers, team CRDL currently being pushed away on stretchers with a few limbs bent unnaturally, groans of pain, and weapons that were damaged beyond repair, while their faces were... well….they might need a bit of plastic surgery to fully fix those.

"Honestly, I almost want to smoke a cigarette right now." Ai said with a sigh of happiness.

Natt snorted "Really? THAT joke? Well, can't say I blame you I suppose."

"As much as I agree, since I'm a doctor, I will personally take away any cigarettes I see you holding and throw them into a paper shredder." Edler told the racer, though he was clearly happy with the situation nonetheless.

"Now that we've had our catharsis and probably fulfilled the dream of a good chunk of the student body, let's get back to work," Natt sighed. "Preferably before we get detention."

"Ozpin will probably tell Glynda to wait before grabbing us." Retsu mused, before picking up something on the floor "Oh hey, I think this is Cardin's tooth."

"Hey you're right...nice right hook," Ai chuckled.

"Now...what do we do? How do we find Vernier?" Edler asked.

"We'd need some way to track him," Natt mused, before pulling out the Jet Combat Gashat. "Think we could use this?"

"I think we could. Bugster or not, he's STILL from that game," Retsu mused.

"But we'd need some kind of tracking program for that...know anyone we could ask?" Ai frowned.

"Well...Chroma is busy, so let's not bother him…" Natt frowned, the four of them thinking hard about it...until they all had a shared brainstorm. "Duo!"

* * *

"A tracking system huh? Well, I guess it'd be possible, I could use the data from the Bang Bang series and Jet Combat since they use minimaps and targeting in certain modes." Duo told them over the scroll.

"How long do you think it'll take you?" Retsu asked.

"Well… give me half an hour, I should have something decent by then, I'll focus on making it track Vernier first and foremost, and make a version for other Bugsters afterwards, since this is pretty important right now." Duo answered.

"Alright, we'll talk to you in a little bit then I suppose, we'll try and find him the old fashioned way in the meantime." Natt said before hanging up his scroll.

"Think he's in town?" Ai asked afterwards.

"I doubt it." Edler said "Any source of stress for Jaune would be at Beacon for now, and Vernier knows leaving the city would be too risky as he'd be quickly spotted if he tried to make a break for Jaune's home."

"So he might be hiding under our nose then?" Natt mused. "You don't think he'd try blending in with our friends would he?"

"I doubt it, they'd probably ask questions Vernier can't answer… that and his voice, it TOTALLY isn't Jaune's voice, you'd have to be a moron to not notice that." Retsu pointed out.

"The only people I know who might fall for that….we just sent them to the hospital," Ai mused.

"...actually what DID Cardin have on Jaune? I mean, if it's something, you don't think Vernier might try to use it to make Jaune's stress increase, do you?" Natt blinked.

"...well, he told us what it was, and if Cardin has even half a brain cell, he'll probably have had it recorded somehow," Retsu gulped.

"Team CRDL's dorm it is," Edler nodded urgently. The group rushed to the room...and found it open.

"Hold it right there Vernier! We're not gonna let you-" Ai started but…

"Save your breath. The neanderthal was stupid enough to NOT keep evidence," Vernier deadpanned, sitting on the windowsill… before promptly leaning back and falling out the window.

The four were silent for a moment, wearing the same deadpan faces Vernier had been "Huh… I'm as disappointed as Vernier was honestly." Natt said, as they went to check out the window, only to not spot a trace of Vernier "Guess he left silently."

"Well, at least we know he'd somewhere around Beacon, so we just need to wait for Duo to call back." Retsu said.

Just a few seconds after he spoke, Natt's scroll started ringing "Speak of the devil?" Retsu asked.

"Huh… nope, I thought it was too." Natt said as he answered "Something up Ruby?"

"Well, I don't want to make you guys panic, but I think I saw a Bugster fly by really fast? He kind of went around a corner and I lost him though because I was surprised." the reaper answered, concern in her voice.

"We know, we're hunting him down right now, thanks for informing us, let us know if you spot him again." Natt told her with a sigh.

"Will do! Good luck guys!" was the cheery reply before she hung up.

"Okay... I've had quite enough of this guy running around," Natt said in annoyance, before pulling out the Jet Combat Gashat along with Bang Bang Shooting, pressing down the two buttons " **BANG BANG SHOOTING!/JET COMBAT!"** which caused both screens to appear, the Jet Combat screen having a small orange robot with gatling gun arms fly out, it's body somewhat shaped like a jet.

" **GACHAN! LEVEL UP! BA-BA-BANG! BA-BA-BANG! YOW! BANG BANG SHOOTING! A GACHA! JET! JET! IN THE SKY! JET! JET! JET COMBA~T!"**

5 seconds later and team CRDL's dorm needed a new window, with Snipe, now in Level 3, going full tilt in the air after where Vernier went. The robot had opened up like the others and essentially swallowed his torso to become armor for him, giving him an orange chestplate over his gauges that looked similar in shape to a cockpit of a jet, the shoulder armor being white, and a pair of orange wings on his back, the two gatling guns right at his hips ready to be grabbed and used, while his helmet now sported a jet fighter pilot's breathing mask, and some orange goggles over his eyes, with the green bang of the helmet now pointing upwards.

"Time to shoot this Bugster down," Snipe said, gunning the wings to chase after Vernier.

It took him a minute to chase down a trail, eventually seeing the smoke trail going around a corner and veering after it, finally finding him "You aren't getting away!"

Vernier looked back, cursing in annoyance "Dammit! Leave me be!"

"You really think I'll just leave you alone when you're holding a friend hostage? Get real!" Snipe shot back. At that he began opening fire and the two soon engaged in a mid-air dogfight. Vernier weaved and barrel rolled to avoid the attacks. Eventually finding an opening, he moved to do a loop, and soon the two were trading fire as both sides weaved and evaded each other's shots. The battle was a seesaw as the two fought for dominance, but eventually it ended….in a draw. Snipe managed to fire some missiles, which Vernier, being in mid-dodge, was unable to evade, taking large damage, but not before he managed to shoot Snipe in one of the wings, causing both to start spiralling out of the air.

Snipe frowned under his helmet, seeing some trees incoming, to which he quickly pulled out the Jet Combat Gashat, causing his extra armor to vanish, following which he could easily grab hold of a branch and used a mix of leverage and momentum to get himself to land safely on the ground. Once he was stable, he pulled out his scroll and dialed his teammates. "Guys, I managed to gun him down, but I don't think I cured the infection. I'll track him down as best as I can, but try to find me using my Scroll's signal," he said.

"Right, we'll be there as soon as we can," Ai's voice said, though before he hung up Snipe noted a question of "Do either of you actually have a driver's license?"

Deciding not to question that last bit, Snipe immediately let his hunter experience take hold, moving through the woods at full alert. He made sure to avoid staying in the open for long, while quickly scanning for any signs of his target. The first clue he was getting close? Several Grunts he noticed wandering around the woods. Quickly getting to a higher point, he proceeded to live up to his namesake and sniped several of the from the cover of the trees, destroying them in one shot, while quickly moving to keep them from finding him. The Grunts, completely in disarray were soon routed, before Snipe's scroll went off. "Yes?"

"This is Duo, I just finished the program. I'll be sending it over, so you SHOULD be able to use it to track him. I can't guarantee if it'll work while Vernier is hiding inside Jaune, but if he's active you should be able to find him," Duo said, quickly sending the program over.

Once the program was received, his scroll sent out a wireless signal into his gashat, and the hud on his visor updated, now showing him a radar function, on which he could see a red dot a little whiles away.

"You aren't getting away you damned bastard." Snipe grunted as he started following the signal.

While following said signal, he got another call, this time from Chroma "I finished the program, uploading it straight to your armor."

"Wait, you can do that?" Snipe asked.

"I'm the one who made them, what do you think?" Chroma shot back, and Snipe could hear the smirk in his voice.

"As long as it works," Snipe shrugged and continued on. It wasn't long before he found more Grunts, and Vernier who had a badly damaged wing and thrusters, meaning he wouldn't be flying long distance anytime soon.

Switching his weapon to riffle mode, Snipe took aim...and took out several Grunts, and quickly moved to another location, the area quickly erupting into chaos.

Vernier actually roared in anger "Just leave me be damn you!" he shouted as his grunts fell like moths to a flame.

"Only when you give Jaune his body back," came Snipe's cold voice...from right next to him!

Vernier actually let out a shriek...in the same voice Jaune did sometimes, as he turned and fired, only for Snipe to evade and literally shoot him in the back.

"No mercy for you," Snipe said simply, closing his Gamer Driver, inserting Jet Combat, and then opening it again, quickly shifting back into Level 3.

"I'm not going down without a fight!" Vernier roared, opening fire, to which Snipe took to the air and evaded without much difficulty, before he returned fire, catching Vernier dead on with a burst of bullets, scoring a flurry of hits.

"Give it up, you're not getting away," Snipe said coldly, locking on again and pelting him with a spray of missiles.

"Gah! Well then, how about this?" Vernier growled, before turning back into Jaune. "Come and try to attack me now!"

In response, Snipe stayed quiet, but flew right at Vernier, and to the Bugster's surprise, socked him in the gut. He was even further surprised as he was forced back into his Bugster form, finding himself unable to change back "What… what did you do?!"

"You SERIOUSLY thought we didn't expect you to pull that trick again?" Snipe smirked. "We had Chroma whip up a little program to stop you from using Jaune as a meat shield. Speaking of which..." he promptly aimed his guns and opened fire at near point blank, sending Vernier back with a burst of bullets.

"I'm not going down THAT easily!" Vernier roared, sending several missiles at Snipe...who promptly gunned them all down.

"No, you are going down that easily," Snipe said simply, before taking out the Jet Combat Gashat and inserting it into his Gashacon Magnum.

" **KIMEWAZA!"** the weapon announced as Snipe aimed at Vernier, who tried to fly away, before he pulled the trigger " **JET CRITICAL FINISH!"**

The Magnum shot out a targeting reticle that quickly stuck to Vernier, before a volley of missiles flew out as well, impacting on the fleeing Bugster. " **KAISHIN NO IPPATSU!"**

Once the smoke cleared, Snipe saw Jaune falling out of it, rushing forward to catch him, right as he heard the announcement of " **GAME CLEAR!"** catching Jaune by the hand right in time.

"Heh… mission complete."

* * *

"Okay, all checks are done, and you're just fine," Spring said with a smile as currently Jaune had been taken back to CR and examined in case of any side effects from his...abnormal Bugster infection.

"Alright… and, there's absolutely nothing wrong with me from having a Bugster in me for years?" He asked, honestly surprised at that.

"Actually, quite the opposite Mr. Arc." Chroma said as he came in, scroll in hand "Vernier having been in your for so long… well, it might give us an edge."

"How so?" Jaune asked, wondering how that could be helpful.

Before Chroma could answer, Edler chimed in "Antibodies from long term exposure, right?"

Chroma nodded with a smirk "Correct, with the blood sample we took from you Jaune, we might be able to help make a vaccine to reduce the chances of infection. But as well, the antibodies can be used to make new, more powerful gashats. And that's without counting the added bonus of you being exposed for so long to the virus, that after removing Vernier from your system, you're pretty much immune to the virus now."

"Wait, so… my blood is going to help people then?" Jaune asked incredulously.

"A LOT of people. Both in hospitals, and on the battlefield. I know it's not the way you expected it, but that's the right path to becoming a hero right there." Chroma said with a chuckle.

Jaune looked down, but smiled a little bit "Yeah… a hero…" he said, before sighing "I should probably pack my bags soon… no doubt Ozpin knows about my forged papers by now."

"Oh, I knew from the start actually." Ozpin said as he came into the room, with the rest of Jaune's team coming in after him but staying silent for now "I however allowed you to come in nonetheless because I knew you had potential to become someone great. That, and Chroma vouched for you after retrieving some of your online video game scores for strategy and puzzle games."

"One of the few players to manage a 10-consecutive win streak in Tetris 99." Chroma said, and Retsu's jaw dropped as he turned to Jaune.

"That was YOU?! You're the guy who kept passing my score in that?!" he asked incredulously.

"Well...yeah I guess. Why is that important?" Jaune blinked.

"Because, that game was made so that not just anyone could clear it to that degree," Chroma chuckled, before going around and retrieving an object, revealing it to be a blue Gashat depicting a rather...emo looking round head with what looked like puzzle pieces behind it, the words 'Perfect Puzzle' printed on it. "Specifically...that game was meant to find a potential user for this guy right here."

* * *

 **DUN DUN DUUUUUN!**

 **I'm sure some of you saw it coming, but yeah, Jaune is a candidate for a Kamen Rider.**

 **As well, Brave and Snipe have now reached Level 3, and, well, Jaune's infection was more advance, but as the story says, that turned out to be a gift.**

 **And the Tetris 99 bit was an idea I came up with on the fly, I mean, picture it, Jaune winning at massive, online Tetris 10 times in a row, beating several other pros.**

 **Also, beating up team CRDL... it was fun to write out that scene.**

 **Anyway, hope you enjoy, and see you next game!**


End file.
